Hard Candy Reviews

(MU) Too effective but the hiper conscious vindictive symbolic Elliott Page character is too much. No place to errors, to hazard, to twists....

Ellen Page plays the manipulative young,teenage girl to the max. One almost feela sorry for Patrick Wilson - but only to a small extent. A cautionary tale for all.

Excellent film. Ellen Page is brilliant. I really enjoyed the suspense and I remember thinking "Is she really going to cut his private parts off?" Definitely another one I would love to add to my collection!!! This movie is an excellent reason why you should NOT meet people online.

The tense atmosphere created by the David Slade is sensational, fully appropriate to the situation. The script outputs can find some questionable time to time, but the film is directed behind to perfectness. The performances need no comment. Page and Wilson support the film with great skill, the progression of the tension is admirable, the expressions full of nuances and subjectivity. Movies that are supported primarily through dialogue efficiently are difficult to make. It all depends on how elaborate and interesting are the characters, their goals and their stories. “Hardy Candy” has two ambiguous characters responsible interpreters. There is no way to say the movie is not good.

Well, I thought it was a rather fascinating and unsettling thriller. Basically, there is one location and almost no action scenes so to keep you interested, they really needed to provided a good story and some pretty good performances. Fortunately, both Patrick Wilson and Ellen Page were both quite amazing , showing, in the process, two different faces of Evil. There is one thing I really found interesting is that there is no good guy here, only two twisted minds and, at the end, I didn't root for either of them and it made it sometimes difficult to care about the whole thing. I was rather amazed that, back then when the movie was released,  all over the internet, you could find some people claiming that Hayley Stark completely rocked, that she did the right thing, etc... Well, as far as I'm concerned, I thought she was a complete psycho and I'm pretty sure this is the point of the movie, not to show she is a heroin but to show that she is really messed up. The fact that Jeff Kohlver is a pedophile doesn't change the fact that she is a potential serial killer and I think it is pretty stupid to root for a psychotic serial killer, even when they are chasing pedophiles. My main concern with this flick is that I kept wondering what was the whole point of it after all. And I'm afraid the whole point was just to shock and put the viewers in a uncomfortable situation. No more and no less. Anyway, in spite of these flaws, I have to admit that it is still a good thriller and it is definitely worth a look.

Jeff: "You were coming on to me!"
Hayley: "Oh, come on. That's what they always say, Jeff."
Jeff: "Who?"
Hayley: "Who? The pedophiles! "Oh, she was so sexy. She was asking for it." "She was only technically a girl, she acted like a woman." It's just so easy to blame a kid, isn't it! Just because a girl knows how to imitate a woman, does NOT mean she's ready to do what a woman does."

Hard Candy is an incisive, stylish, provocative, innovative, edge-of-your-seat psychological thriller that is effortlessly superior to an abundance of other contemporary horror films. Saw and Hostel probe the concept of cold-blooded killers, frequently displaying gratuitous violence and gore, whereas writer Brian Nelson and director David Slade circumvent the clichés and produce a wholly original thriller. Paedophilia is a key concern in recent society. Slade and Nelson use this issue of paedophilia as a foundation on which to build the plot and story. Gone is the senseless slasher tone and the unnecessarily gory deaths...Hard Candy is potent and relentlessly intense with minimal quantities of gore. The tension is instituted through the powerhouse performances and elegance in the camera techniques. Slade's solid direction keeps the situations tight and the characters compelling. Even better, the film's most riveting sequence is scary not due to the gore, but the suggestion of what's occurring. Throughout every scene, the director will keep you rapt and immersed...the proceedings are also unpredictable, which makes the film far more terrifying.

Fundamentally a two-person drama, the story concerns a typical case of paedophilia with the tables reversed. Hayley (Page) is a precocious, teasingly sexy 14-year-old girl who befriends charming, boyish 32-year-old photographer Jeff (Wilson) over the internet. They've been chatting online for three weeks, and eventually decide to meet in person at a coffee shop. Before long they're travelling back to Jeff's home for an impromptu photo-shoot. Hayley's malevolent secret agenda is soon revealed: she suspects Jeff of being a paedophile, and commences a hard-hitting investigation in an attempt to reveal his possibly scandalous past.

Slade keeps remarkable control, steadily divulging information in a sequence of moments that delicately develop suspense, anxiety and most significantly it cultivates scepticism about the true identities of Hayley and Jeff, what they've done and what they're going to do. It's a dexterous balancing act, made icier by the decorous compositions, application of close-ups and selective focus, as well as temperamental digital complexion for each shot. Jeff's home is an intricately designed and perfectly suits its purpose in the story. Additionally, there's a strong sense of claustrophobia as Ellen Page's Hayley unleashes her maligned plans to her hopeless victim. Like I said before, gratuitous gore is never showcased. It's the themes and convincing performances that will have an audience petrified. Witness a man getting castrated and having the essence of his joy department mashed in a garbage disposal unit.

Full credit must go to the pairing of Ellen Page and Patrick Wilson for their intense performances and skilful executions of complex characters. Ellen Page recently appeared on the map for a sleuth of excellent performances. Ellen rapidly became one of my favourite actresses, and with each new film my respect heightens for her. Not only is she extremely beautiful but she has talent. Hard Candy marks her greatest performance yet: a dark, unspeakably disturbing teenager whose intentions could put all the horror movie serial killers to shame. On top of this the character is well written: she's snappy, intelligent and quick-witted. Slade's sole misstep was making her a tad too knowing. Occasionally this is unrealistic.
Patrick Wilson's charismatic Jeff probably deserves the comeuppance he receives, but it's possible to feel profoundly sorry for his character.

Overall, Hard Candy is the greatest thriller I've seen for an extremely long time. It's a brilliant film crammed with potency and suspense. It's difficult to tell that this is David Slade's feature film debut simply because his directing never treads a wrong foot. The film is easily superior to most modern horror fares due to Slade's decision to opt for gruelling realism and scenarios that will keep a viewer hooked for the running time. Every shot and every frame is immaculately constructed; ergo the visuals cannot be faulted.
Hard Candy is a crackling thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat: it's not easy viewing, but it's intelligent, involving and thoroughly challenging.

8.7/10

Hard Candy was a great movie which leaves you saying was he the bad one or was she really bad. This movie also had it's great scenes even though most violent scenes appear off camera what you can see the pain in Jeff's face who is played by Patrick Wilson. The castration scene was a little bit sick but he give it a good job on that i have to say after cutting you know what yes his balls you see are doing horrible things with them. Ellen Page now she also had a good part in this movie she gets you to believe her most times. Sandra Oh only appears in the one scene i can't really say much about her.
This movie is worth watching i enjoyed it and stuff like this with meeting people off the Internet can really happen and thats one of the points the movie is trying to send out.

Excellent. I love the concept. It's so refreshing watching something different for a change rather then the same ole story and I thought it was great how they did the end leaving you wondering certain things (of course I can't elaborate because I'll give it away). I thought it was a very good performance from Ellen Page (Hayley) too, especially seeing as the topic wasn't a pleasant one.

Very slow paced, not quite what I expected.