I’ve been working on a cool blog for the past few months and would love for you guys to check it out!! I review movies (mostly horror) on there and soon I’m going to expand into doing some stuff with TV shows from the late 90’s/ early 2000’s!
You can find it over at quinnlikesmovies.wordpress.com
After a new couple decides to isolate themselves from the rest of the world, they create a new world for themselves called “Candiland”. In which, their fun relationship slowly ascends into madness.
This movie is… interesting. I don’t really know how I feel about it, I didnt love this movie but I didnt hate it. Candiland was able to keep my attention because Peter (James Clayton) and Tess (Chelah Horsdal) are doomed characters from the start and I wanted to see how they declined.
From the first scene, the audience can tell that these characters have something psychologically wrong with them. While it’s not specifically specified what mental illness Peter is suffering from (my best guess is schizophrenia), we follow them as they fall deeper into this delusion, resulting in folie a deux. Candiland does a great job in making mental illness seem scary (not a good thing). While I’ve never suffered from this specific illness, there are many people who have that can live normal lives. However, because Peter is untreated and Tess is catering to his delusions, they worsen as the movie progresses when Peter starts to truly believe he is a god. He does some disturbing things and, because she is suffering from her own past trauma, Tess is unable to take a step back and realize how toxic this relationship is. Candiland is basically a worst case scenario movie for both romantic and parental relationships.
This movie is split into three different time frames, when Peter and Tess meet/ their early relationship, their slowly declining relationship, and when their apartment is infested with police investigating their death. We jump back and forth between these different timelines, but it always seems to come out of nowhere with no transition. This might be a good time to mention that this was previously a book by Elizabeth Engstorm. While the transition points would be the end and beginning of a new chapter, we’re met with a total tone shift and confusion (at least in the beginning). We get more context as the film goes on and are able to put pieces of the puzzle together, but I think this could have been done better.
The more I think and try to critique Candiland, the more I wonder how much of it was purposeful. From the beginning I didnt like Peter because I thought he was fake or could sense something was off. Looking back, I realize he was just in a manic episode. Later in the movie, I hated when they were speaking in one to three word sentences, but later I realized it was because they spend so much time around each other they can easily understand each other.
After all the negative things I’ve said about Candiland, I want to touch upon one of the true highlights- James Clayton. Clayton plays the role of Peter and put 110% into this role. From start to finish, he looks like a totally different person. He had to lose so much weight for this role and catapult his mind into a deeply dark place, I cannot imagine how this process was for him. While Chela Horsdal and Gary Busey were great, Clayton was a serious stand out actor in this movie and I will be seeking out some of his other work.
Candiland was ok, it kept me interested, was thrilling, and had amazing lead actors, but does the good outweigh the bad? Some corny jokes, awkward transitions, triggering content, and demonizing mental illness.. I dont quite know. I left a lot of plot points out in my review because I think the best way to watch this movie is to get swept up in the confusion, however there is a lot of triggering content in this movie, like demonizing mental illness, so i’d say proceed with caution. Candiland isn’t a fun movie to watch with friends, definitely more of a solitary movie to watch alone.
