 I feel like I was lied to. The movie Hard Candy features no hard candy. Not a single piece of goodness for your mouth in the entire film. I was looking for like a breath mint, a tic-tac, something. Instead, what I got was a stomach-churning thriller for the whole family to not watch because it's intense. This is a not all ages affair. Let's quickly talk about hard candy. ["Hard Candy"] This video review comes from Vin over at Patreon.com slash Adam Does Movies. Had he not recommended this movie, there is not a chance in hell I would have talked about it. I did see hard candy back in the day. I thought it was pretty solid. It was fun going back all these years later with fresh eyes, hungry eyes, if you will, like the song. Hungry eyes. It's a different experience when you're adult, but still a tough watch all the same. Let's dive in. Director David Slade and writer Brian Nelson team up again after doing 30 days of night, solid film, for this hard candy. This is a good old fashioned bottle episode. You know, one of those movies where it kind of takes place in one isolated location, typically with only a couple of people, you have movies like Phone Booth, Buried, and now here we are with hard candy. The movie stars Patrick Wilson, who I've been told I look like from time to time, along with Adam Sandler and Chris Pratt and Ryan Reynolds. It's a very bizarre hodgepodge of people. How could I look like all of these people? It doesn't make any sense. It also stars Elliot Page as Ellen Page, plain Haley Stark. That's not confusing, but that's what IMDB says, so I'll go with it. Sandra Oh is also in this for four minutes. Nice check for her, she can go back to Grey's Anatomy. That's pretty much the entire cast. I don't want to give away the goat with this story. I don't know if that's even an expression, but I'm expressing it, but I will say this. You should check out hard candy, not because it's a fun experience or a wild time, but because it's an interesting one. It's a premise about a predator becoming the hunted, a hunter being stalked and laid down and put in his place. This Haley Stark character is more than meets the eye. No, she's not an Autobot. She's a Decepticon though, and this guy's gonna find out that he flirted with the wrong girl over text message. This has your early 2000s stank all over it. It's got the shaky cam, the intense look. Everything's moving frantically. There's scenes where I have no idea what's going on with the camera. I think the director was just throwing it. He's just like, action! Hits Elliot in the head, what the hell? Keep going! But at the same time it works. This movie is frantic, it is intense. Even when it's slow and there's just this dialogue between the two characters, it's really just gives you a disgusting feeling, a sick feeling, which is what I really enjoy about watching movies. You know what it reminds me of that came out not that long ago is Midsomer. Throughout the entirety of Midsomer, I was just sitting here with a gut ache, like, oh my God, why am I watching this? And why do I wanna rewatch it? I don't wanna rewatch Hard Candy. I've seen it twice, so I guess that really has no marriage. But it's been a long time. I forgot, I had to refresh my memory. It visually looks solid. Shaky Cam's not obnoxious. It only happens when it needs to, when there is a little bit of action in a somewhat slow-moving affair. But I never found myself bored. It moves at a good clip. It's got good framing, some really pretty cinematography, a nice looming soundtrack in the background, and really solid performances. Patrick Wilson, pretending that he's getting his balls cut off is honestly amazing. The castration award at the Oscars was sadly missing that year. The film presents moral dilemmas, and it makes you ask the question, like, what's the point? What's the point of this revenge porn-style flick? Is it worth it to get back at someone like that? Is it even really helpful to make a pedophile or someone in a disgusting position take a look in the mirror and then attack them for it? Is that really gonna rehabilitate future people? Is it really doing anything but being a ugly revenge story? And that's the thing that people can look at and have a conversation about, certainly more than, like, secret life of pets. I mean, granted, they're not really similar genres to begin with, but you get what I'm saying. There's a conversation to be had when you watch a movie like this. It pulls at you a little bit. It makes you think about things through a different lens. And I appreciate the request. So thank you, Vin. This was my hard candy review. It's a decent film. It's a decent film. I can't say I love it. I certainly didn't hate it. It's just, it's worth a watch. It's worth checking out. It won't be for everyone, but definitely was for Vin. So thank you, sir. Like this video if you had a good time. Please subscribe if you're new here. I post tons of movie reviews every week. They're not always chasing the trends, either. They're not always the big hotness. Sometimes they're just from generations ago. They're from people just like you making requests on Patreon or on YouTube Join. I appreciate it. All right, hopefully I'll see you next time. Take care.