Candy

Based on Luke Davies' titular novel, director Neil Armfield's film about a young couple's disastrous descent into drug addiction boasts a strong performance from Heath Ledger that overshadows the work of up-and-coming costar Abbie Cornish. When we first meet would-be artists Dan and Candy (he a poet, she a painter), the former is a heroin user who hooks the latter. The pair's occasional supplier is Casper (Geoffrey Rush), a gay academic who treats them with paternal interest and provides hits and occasional cash infusions to keep them going. But when Candy winds up pregnant, they try—in what's certainly the picture's most harrowing sequence—to go cold turkey before finally reverting to form. From this point on the deterioration continues, with Dan struggling to adhere to a government program to wean them off drugs while Candy relapses. Ultimately, Candy feels like an unflinching version of an after-school special, full of life lessons and rather obvious metaphors. Still, Ledger's finely-tuned portrait of a young man—grown old before his time and desperately trying to put his life back together—makes this a strong optional purchase. [Note: DVD extras include audio commentary with director Neil Armfield and writer Luke Davies, the nine-minute 'making-of' featurette 'The Path to Wild Abandon,' 'Writing on the Wall: Candy's Poem in Motion' (3 min.), and trailers. Bottom line: a small extras package for an uneven film.] (F. Swietek) [Blu-ray Review—Dec. 3, 2019—Shout! Factory, 118 min., R, Blu-ray: $27.99—Making its debut on Blu-ray, 2006’s Candy features a fine transfer and a DTS-HD 5.1 soundtrack. Extras include the production featurettes 'The Path to Wild Abandon' (9 min.) and 'Writing on the Wall: Candy’s Poem in Motion' (3 min.). Bottom line: boasting a fine performance from Heath Ledger, this looks good on Blu-ray.]