A variation on the home invasion thriller, The Devil's Candy is the sophomore feature from Australian director Sean Byrne (2010's The Loved Ones). A film about parenthood, murder, madness, possession and heavy metal music, it is best described as The Amityville Horror meets Metallica. Jesse Hellman (Ethan Embry) is an artist who moves his family into a large farmhouse in rural Texas where he has more freedom to continue his work. And the house comes with a dark history, as the psychotic Ray Smilie (Pruitt Taylor Vince, from Heavy, etc) killed his parents. Both deaths were ruled accidental and the house was put on the market. But soon after, Ray knocks at the door, and wants back in his house. Ray becomes obsessed with Jesse's goth metalhead daughter Zooey (Kiara Glasco, from David Cronenberg's Maps To The Stars, etc). Meanwhile Jesse is haunted by the same bizarre voices that drove Ray to kill his parents and he becomes obsessed with a somewhat dark themed painting. Ray is a nasty piece of work, and a killer of children. Vince is perfectly cast as Ray, with his lumbering gait, his untidy red jumpsuit, his empty gaze and intimidating manner he brings this hulking man child to life. Embry is largely cast against type here, and with his beard and long hair vaguely resembles a Jesus-like figure, which complements the more religious undertones of the film. Glasco is also very good as the Zooey and brings a feisty quality to her performance. As he demonstrated with his first film, Byrne is adept at gradually building up the suspense and uneasy atmosphere before unleashing a rather violent climax. He suffuses the home invasion tropes with a touch of the supernatural. However, the horror here is a bit more restrained and less graphic than the torture porn of The Loved Ones. The discordant aural soundtrack provided by Sunn O)))) adds to the gradual air of uneasiness. Hopefully it's not another six years before Byrne makes another film.
Review of The Devil's Candy
