The 1992 Movie Candyman is based on Clive Barker's short story The Forbidden. This short story supplies the majority of the backstory in the movie. One difference between the two is the setting. The Forbidden is set in Liverpool, England. Candyman is set in Cabrini-Green on Chicago's Southside.
Legend has it that if you say Candyman's name in the mirror 5 times, he will appear. In the movie, Ruthie Jean is murdered by someone coming through her bathroom Mirror. The residents of her building, one of whom is Ann Marie McCoy, say Candyman killed Ruthie. Why is this particular part of the story important? Because it is based on true events.
On April 22, 1987, a resident of Chicago's South Side named Ruthie Mae McCoy called 911 reporting that someone in the apartment next door was trying to come through her bathroom mirror. She told the Dispatcher "They throwed the cabinet down".
The building had narrow passages between the apartments for maintenance. The passages became a popular way for burglars to break in by pushing the bathroom cabinet out of the wall.
The neighbors reported gunshots coming from McCoy's apartment. The police would not break down the door, afraid they would be sued. Two days later the building superintendent drilled the locks and found Ruthie Mae face down, shot four times.
Candyman might be the scariest part of the movie but the real-life, tragic, death of Ruthie Ann McCoy is what puts real fear in us.
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