CANDYMAN Trailer: Don't. Don't Say It.

Seriously. I've always been a scardey-cat, as the saying goes, so I never managed to say Candyman five times in front of the mirror. Or Bloody Mary. The first Candyman is a stroke of brilliance, not only as a horror film, but an examination of the urban landscape, the gentrification and erasure of black neighbourhoods in American in favour of white greed, and how pain and trauma reach across generations.

It's a story that still has much to tell, and the highly anticipated spiritual sequel has just dropped its poster and first trailer. Directed by Nia DaCosta (Little Woods), starring Yahya Abdul-Mateen II (Us, Watchmen) and Teyonah Parris (If Beale Street Could Talk), produced by Jordan Peele (Get Out), this new Candyman looks just as rich, layered, and downright terrifying.

For as long as residents can remember, the housing projects of Chicago’s Cabrini Green neighborhood were terrorized by a word-of-mouth ghost story about a supernatural killer with a hook for a hand, easily summoned by those daring to repeat his name five times into a mirror. In present day, a decade after the last of the Cabrini towers were torn down, visual artist Anthony McCoy and his girlfriend, gallery director Brianna Cartwright, move into a luxury loft condo in Cabrini, now gentrified beyond recognition and inhabited by upwardly mobile millennials.

With Anthony’s painting career on the brink of stalling, a chance encounter with a Cabrini Green old-timer exposes Anthony to the tragically horrific nature of the true story behind Candyman. Anxious to maintain his status in the Chicago art world, Anthony begins to explore these macabre details in his studio as fresh grist for paintings, unknowingly opening a door to a complex past that unravels his own sanity and unleashes a terrifyingly viral wave of violence that puts him on a collision course with destiny.

I would be in with this description alone, but the trailer has me completely hooked (pun most definitely intended). DaCosta's eye for intimate details should serve well a story like this, and with a stellar cast to back it up. Trailer is below. You might want to have someone in the room when you watch it. A room without mirrors.