Hard Candy [Blu-ray]

4 Comments

1. IKCWMBFD

   October 14, 2010 at 5:00 am

   Review by IKCWMBFD for Hard Candy [Blu-ray]
   Rating:
   I tried ages ago to post a lengthy and mostly critical review of this but for whatever reason it never made it up (hmmmmm). So this review is going to be far less detailed because I just don’t want to type up all those thoughts over again.

   Hard Candy is a really frustrating film because it could have been a great one. The premise is a grabber and the actors are very talented and game, but the problem is that the script just collapses as the movie goes on. The fatal flaw is that the writers suddenly decide about halfway through that Hayley is going to be a genius mastermind figure, instead of the precocious, ambitious, more or less realistic girl she starts out as.

   Mastermind figures in suspense movies are useful to writers because they always are one step ahead of everybody else. So they can set up diabolical schemes and traps simply to torment their victims and generate lots of suspense for the audience. Since they know what people will do ahead of time, they know how to stage these traps to maximize drama, to make their victims think they have the upper hand, but they are always in control and pull the rug out from under at the last minute. Why do they do all this? Well, because they are supergenius masterminds and they like to mess with people, to put them through the ringer. Now, an omniscient supergenius in a movie like in Saw, for example, is fine given the limited ambitions of Saw (and don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed Saw). But here, in a movie that should have had ambitions to be more than a generic thrill machine, it is just the wrong thing to do and particularly when you are talking about a 14 year old protagonist. And so, the last half of the movie is filled with completely implausible and virtually impossible plot developments all meant just to milk a few more manipulative thrills from the basic set up. Think hard about virtually any of the situations in the second half and ask yourself *why* Jeff or Hayley do certain things and how or why Hayley would bother to orchestrate these narrative events to occur if she knew from the start all the things she is revealed to know at the end. Once you start to question, you realize how completely overengineered the plot twists are.

   The bottom line is that the writing is fundamentally lazy and the narrative events stunningly arbitrary, which is a serious disappointment given the potential this idea had.

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2. Luca Graziuso

   October 14, 2010 at 4:11 am

   Review by Luca Graziuso for Hard Candy [Blu-ray]
   Rating:
   There are movies that haunt you and others that keep you guessing; there are horror flicks and daring mind-benders; there are suspense ridden narratives and atypical treaures: Hard candy is all of the above. The terrible intolerable need to continue watching absorbs and terrifies while you seem disturbed by a need to find a side to root for. The pedophile photographer who may have committed a homicide or the teenager who seems bent on revenge with such hatred you feel for her psychological statae of mind and her emotional integrity while admiring the psychological battle of wits that throws every trick in the book and seemingly confiscates the essence of every psychotic malady the rational rituals of desire have equipped human nature with. Ellen Page is too good to be true and so belligerent in her sympathetic role that you can’t stand her. She does what no one at her age has ever been able to do, namely reconcile the taboo of social mores with a nefarious bristling candor that thwarts the desire to continue to watch. She is placed aface Patrick Wilson who performs the role of a pedophile with impenetrable guile and belated predatory pride. He runs the gamut of psycho games and betrays psychobabble while his counterpart frustrates his strategic acumen by outsmarting him to such an extent you wonder as he does: Who is this girl? It gets terrifyiing and tense in a swell of emotional callousness that dumbs the pity elusively ambling in a dialogue that is always disquieted by minds that forage a loot in every chance digression. It is shot with bestirring incision and lavish in its climactic rush. I do not think a movie could be shot with more intensity. Here we see the madness of psychology at its tenderest and it sickens but always concentrates on a suspenseful emotional heap that litters the intelligence of the two parties. Poker face after poker face we experience the insistence of insanity at its most gripping hold, but not the newspaper brand, here we have a mixture of hatred and desire controlled and fashioned by a shooting that ends with the incredible after the impossibly disgusting has been shaved a few times. This movie is an absolutely astonding psychological maze and a social commentary that undoes the sutures of a world where reason is used to abuse and torture, and where justice is a questionable prospect of soulless proportions. Wow.

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3. K. Harris

   October 14, 2010 at 3:19 am

   Review by K. Harris for Hard Candy [Blu-ray]
   Rating:
   I will admit something up front. I am a sucker for a tight, clever script where there is plenty of verbal sparring. Intelligent (might I even say–“thought provoking”) drama gets me off. Two of my favorite classics are “The Lion in Winter” and “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolff?”–two powerful, but wickedly funny, verbal bloodbaths based on plays. Now I’m not saying “Hard Candy” falls into that league, but it is certainly refreshing to watch an adult film with an actual point-of-view that doesn’t dumb itself down for mass consumption.

   Ellen Page and Patrick Wilson are both suberb, and there are enough twists and action to keep the viewer guessing through their game of cat-and-mouse. This is a sweet antidote to the usual summer blockbuster–one that will make you think and one that you will remember.

   Not to provide a spoiler, but the film does wrap itself up rather tidily–which keeps it from being truly brilliant (I’d actually give it 4 1/2 stars). But I was riveted throughout.

   A word of warning, however, I imagine a lot of people might not like this film. But if you are a fan of well-scripted, well- acted drama and open to the subject matter (might be too controversial or even too graphic for some), I’d definitely give this a try. KGHarris, 9/06.

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4. Mark It Zero

   October 14, 2010 at 2:53 am

   Review by Mark It Zero for Hard Candy [Blu-ray]
   Rating:
   It’s safe to say that before the release of the film I was basically foaming at the mouth in anticipation. I don’t know what it was that drew me so strongly to it, but there was something about it that just wet my appetite for great cinema.

   So, the week came when it was to be released, and Friday rolled around. I went to see it – and left utterly disappointed. I don’t know what I expected from the film, from all the press I read I expected simple torture then an end to the film, but what I got, I later realized, was so much more.

   The story, although topical to some degree, is at first glance a story of one person wanting to teach another a lesson about the “naughty” things they do, ALA Seven and Saw. But as the film unfolds the true faces are shown, and they’re ugly. Ellen Page and Patrick Wilson turn in flawless performances, as they’re the only main actors in the film, Sandra Oh plays a small, yet somewhat vital role, and then there’s that one guy at the cafe.

   The reason I detested this movie was for one simple reason – manipulation. NEVER in my life have I seen a film where my beliefs and feelings concerning the characters has shifted so furiously between one and the other. You sincerely believe that Jeff is an innocent man and that Haley is simply a sociopath. As the story unfolds, if you see the film in the same light as I did, by the end you’ll be completely worn out, and left with a feeling of bleakness.

   With most recent horror films focusing mainly on the gore aspect, and very little story, albeit one as complex as this, it was incredibly refreshing to see a horror/suspense film that was something that could just possibly top Hitchcock in his finest hour.

   A true masterpiece.

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