A BRILLIANT AND VERY CLEVER HORROR/THRILLER 9.5 OUT OF 10
Added 2/1/2010
I had heard a great deal of positive response on this film, but hadn't got around to watching it until recently. I expected it to be good, but I never expected anything this good. The writing is razor-sharp and the film is completely unpredictable which made it so fiendishly good and enormously entertaining.
WHAT IT'S ABOUT: A fourteen-year-old girl named Haley meets a thirty-two-year-old guy named Jeff over the internet and they decide to meet at a restaurant and then decide to go back to his place. He shows her around his home and decides to give her some drinks as well. But Haley turns the tables on Jeff and she drugs him and holds him captive in his own home where she constantly interrogates him and asks him the whereabouts a missing woman whose picture he just so happens to have and what he did the teenage girls he took pictures of. No matter what Jeff does, she always outsmarts him and mocks him in the process.
MUSIC: The music for the most part is actually pretty good, and it fit the mood of this psychotic and brilliant horror/thriller very well.
ACTING: I really got to hand it to Ellen Page's performance (She was the actress who played Juno), she easily gives the best performance. She was smart, witty with dark humor, and she played the role a psychopath flawlessly. Patrick Wilson (He played Nite Owl in Watchmen) also puts on a great show as a demented pedaphile who is terrified of this girl. For the most part, I can see no flaws in their performances.
ACTION: This film is mostly dialogue only. There is very little in terms of violence and almost no blood. I really have to hand it to the writer of this film because the dialogue is sharp and clever and this film was almost never boring (Though there were a few moments in which it was a tad boring). The characters always had something to talk about and keep you on edge the entire time. This film feels very fresh and is completely unpredictable and waiting for what's around the next corner is always exciting.
OVERALL: Tired of the usual cliched horror films or thrillers? Hard Candy is the perfect choice for you. This film is a superbly crafted piece that always leaves you on edge and always makes you guess what comes next. You can't say that about other films in this day and age.
THE GOOD: Sharply written story and dialogue, good music, and flawless acting.
THE BAD: Some moments were a tad boring.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
|
Terrific performances and photography; extreme unpleasantness; a mixed bag that's hard to swallow
Added 1/22/2010
There are an awful lot of great movies that have been made about voyeurism, sexual predators, revenge; the careers of Roman Polanski and Michael Haneke among others are testaments to our fascination with the subject. HARD CANDY goes deeper than most into many of these themes, but sadly falls far short of greatness. There's no way I can say anything much about it without significant SPOILERS, so be warned.
Precocious teen Hayley (Ellen Page, quite brilliant) meets much older photographer Jeff (the always excellent Patrick Wilson) in an internet chatroom, and then for real at a coffee shop. It's "meet-cute" with lots of saucy, seductive banter -- mostly on the part of Ellen -- and though it's engagingly filmed (lots of close-ups and interesting cutting in the early scenes, in brightly lit widescreen) it unsettled me, not because of the ickiness factor but because I didn't buy it. I didn't buy for a second that Ellen was going to be a victim, which was fine -- she obviously knows what she's doing, that's believable -- but that led me not to buy that Jeff - who seems just as smart as Ellen, and much more in control of himself than he apparently really is - would go along with it. Is he so wrapped up in his good fortune that he doesn't see her playing him? Perhaps, but the film strives for a lot of realism throughout and this was the first element that didn't work.
When they leave the cafe and head to Jeff's somewhat remote hilltop suburban ranch home, the troubles really begin, both for Jeff who is soon to get more than he could possibly have bargained for, and the viewer, who is treated to a higher level of sadism and a more excruciating, drawn out series of psychological tortures than necessary or perhaps possible. I wonder if the filmmakers were aiming at this point more for the horror film audience than for the serious art-film audience; indeed the whole film seems to be stuck between these two basic kinds of spectators - or notions of spectatorship.
The most serious problem for me, ultimately, is that the film once having demonstrated that Ellen is at least a borderline psychopath herself then lets her off the hook by demonizing Jeff in an entirely unambiguous and exploitational way. The end result is that we are supposed to cheer on Ellen as she completes her horrifying but seemingly righteous plan; some will buy that and love it. I didn't, and the terrific performances and interesting film-making choices did not redeem it. All in all, I'm left with very mixed feelings: on the one hand, there's an intellectual and moral cop-out in the way the characters are handled in the third act; on the other, the visceral outrage and sickening feelings do come through. I don't know whether to recommend this to anyone or not, really - take that as you will.
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
|
Hard to swallow
Added 1/15/2010
This visually spare movie has a very theatrical feel; it's shot almost entirely on a single set and has just three cast members. The performances of the two main actors are riveting and provide 90 minutes of compelling viewing. And it's these performances alone that make the film worth watching.
Sadly, Hard Candy is simply too implausible and exploitative to be of any real value. Page's character is far more resourceful, remorseless, relentless, and self-assured than any 14-year-old. Her morality, which is pivotal, becomes increasingly ambiguous as the film progresses, and the violence, although it mostly takes place out of shot, verges uncomfortably close to torture porn, displacing any message that might have been intended, and polarising the viewer's sympathies. The shock tactics used here, which would be perfectly acceptable in a horror vehicle, are out of place in a film such as this.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
|
Contrived but still compelling throughout...
Added 1/14/2010
HC delivers suspense in a minimal setting. You can gather the plot from other reviews and synopsis but the two leads carry bulk of this film in a manner that recalled Farrah Fawcett's "Extremities". If you seen that and liked it you'll probably rave over this. Though the ending may lead viewers to think it's highly improbable this guy would carry through with his fatal choice. Also, if this is the man guilty of the crime he's being tortured for it seems more likely he would have done away with this girl early on during one of several escape episodes. Still, Definitely worth a look and a thought.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
|
Glad I bought it!
Added 1/13/2010
This disturbing movie is about internet predators, but not what you would expect. Pretty much all the action takes place between two characters who are brilliantly cast. Acting is superb! Storyline is believable. I saw the last half of the movie on TV and immediately went to Amazon to buy it so I could see how it began. Have watched it many times since. Not a movie for the faint at heart. This is a keeper!
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
|
Did not play properly on my Blu-Ray Player
Added 2/6/2010
I ordered a replacement but I'm sure that it won't work either. The disk loads but all you get is a black screen. Amazon lists no reigon or coding info about this disk on their product information page. I would sugest that Amazon stop selling this movie until they can determined when it can be played in the States on a Blu-Ray player.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
|
Does not play on PS3
Added 1/9/2010
This review is for the Australian import Blu-Ray Hard Candy , as of today there is no US Blu-Ray release of this film . This Blu-Ray is region A/B/C but the disc was encoded at 1080i/50Hz and will not play in many US Blu-Ray players including the PS3 (I tested it on my fully updated US PS3 and got a black screen 1-9-2010). The movie itself looks and sounds great on Blu-Ray and this release includes absolutely zero in the extras department .
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
|
