EVIL Has a Sweet Tooth for Children! “The Devil’s Candy” reviewed! (Second Sight Films / 4K UHD and Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on June 14, 2026

“The Devil’s Candy” 4K UHD and Blu-ray Is Now Available from Second Sight Films!

A financially struggling, heavy metal inspired painter buys a bargain country house with an adjacent studio to work toward commissions and to home his wife and daughter in a bigger, lighter space. When an unstable man with a child-like intellect disability arrives at their doorstep, wanting to come home to play his electric axe guitar to drown out the Satanic chants he continues to hear, he becomes the beginning of the family’s nightmare in their new home. The man is a child serial killer, an unwilling agent of the Devil, who believes children are the Devil’s candy and when he can’t muffle out the continuous chanting in his ear, he must obey the commands to supply his master with more hacked up adolescence. A couple of near miss encounters with the painter’s young daughter put the family on edge and into police witness protection but that won’t stop him from coming for her.

Sean Byrne, the Australian filmmaker who debuted with the insane prom queen killer in “The Loved Ones” and who turned Jai Courtney into a shark-obsessed serial killer in “Dangerous Animals,” directed “The Devil’s Candy” in between those two productions and is his only solely U.S. produced film to date. The 2015 film that mirrors the Satanic Panic era with its heavy metal and its unspecified yet strongly suggested 1980’s motif is written by Byrnes to symbolize the contentious efforts to divide family bonds in the best and worst of times with the killer representing the invasive and dangerous wedge when the painting father suddenly develops a muse for his work, losing track of time while working and neglecting his family responsibilities. “The Devils Candy” is produced by Jess Wu and Keith Calder (“You’re Next,” “The Guest”), Chris Harding (“You’re Next,” “The Guest”), and Roxanne Benjamin (“Southbound”) under HanWay Films and in association with Snoot Entertainment.

Ethan Embry is an interesting casting choice to be play principal father Jesse, a father-painter with a heavy metal music edge who becomes possessed to paint disturbing images of upside crosses and children burning. Embry, who has the softest, puppy-dog eyes in the industry, fits remarkably as the likeable Jesse, sporting a long hair wig overtop his scruffy facial hair and athletic and muscular toned body that becomes a character in itself to display his intensity as a normal painter and more so as a possessed painter but never leaning toward being malevolent under the influence of possession, just a bad dad to daughter Zooey (Kiara Glasco, “Maps to the Stars”) that jeopardizes their close bond. I found it curious that Shiri Appleby, “The Killing Floor”) is mostly out of the narrative picture as wife Astrid. There are a couple of heart-ot-heart scenes between her and husband Jesse but from the most part, Astrid is absent working across town and leaving much of the family relationship strain in the hands of Zooey and Jesse without Astrid weighing on Jesse’s lapse in judgements: forgetting to pickup Zooey from school, leaving the door open late at night while painting, etc. Astrid is written with too much understanding and not enough mother bear ferocity. My personal favorite supporting actor, who has been around for decades and here has a bigger antagonist role, is Pruitt Taylor Vince finding and exhibiting his inner calling to kill children. “The Identity” and “Mississippi Burning” actor with noticeable nystagmus that moves his eyes involuntarily, mostly side to side, has in his firm grip one of the more subtle yet disturbing characters with layers, struggling with the Devil’s speak commanding his ear and becoming violent went his attempts to subside the viperous, chanting tongue hit roadblocks. “The Devil’s Candy” rounds out the supporting pars with Tony Amendola (“The Curse of La Llorona”), Leland Orser (“Alien Resurrection”), Craig Nigh (“Terror Birds”), Oryan Landa (“Hollow Scream”), Jamie Tisdale (“From Dusk till Dawn: The Series”), Mylinda Royer, Marco Perella, and Sheila Bailey Lucas.

Satan and heavy metal are nearly synonymous in the horror assemblage – Charles Martin Smith’s 1986 “Trick or Treat,” John Fasano’s 1987 “Rock ‘n’ Roll Nightmare,” Jason Howden’s “Deathgasm,” and even “Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey” blends Hell with Rock ‘n’ Roll! – and all give a villainy credit to the God antithesis known as the Satan. “The Devil’s Candy” is a poster child for the Metal and Satan genre, as part of the dubbed “Metalsploition” or “Rocksploitation.” Yet, the Sean Byrne film plays a different kind of setlist, one that doesn’t slap Satanic right into your face but rather plays to the tune of possible mental illness with a subtle flavor of supernatural forces at work, behind the veil of derangement and delusion. Hell and brimstone, corporeal demons, or any kind of the depths emerging from the fiery pits of the underworld are greatly and purposefully omitted from “The Devil’s Candy” and that is a welcome change from the aforesaid films, grounding this terrifying exchange more onto the fabric reality, as seen in news reports of child kidnapping and murder. This instability doesn’t only apply to the Pruitt Taylor Vince’s Devil whispered, child-killing character but also applies to Embry’s Jesse, a family man with a metal edge who flirts with temptation, tempted to the darker side of metal, by being influenced with a malevolent muse to draw disturbing images and skirting responsibility that threatens the stability of his family, causing trust severing discord. He also toys getting in bed with an artist curator who thrives and lusts after dark, provocative, profane art, with his gallery name being Belial – another name used for Satan in other cultural and religious beliefs. Jesse must resist fame, fortune, and the guile techniques of Satan on Earth, another pointblank theme mentioned in the movie with a televangelist and return to his roots of connecting with his daughter and wife instead of selling his soul, or selling out, to the Devil.

Second Sight Film’s dual format, 2-disc, 4K UHD and Blu-ray set of “The Devil’s Candy” is a tremendous gift to the physical media world. The HVEC encoded, 2160p resolution, BD100 and the AVC encoded, 1080p resolution, BD50 are strikingly peak picture quality for their respective formats. The limited edition contains a new, producer-approved 4K restoration of the original digital print and, while there’s likely not a massive different between the digital master and the restoration, Second Sight’s imaging for the release is superb, nonetheless. Hovering a settled moody and low-key tone, creating an abundance of shadows and underexposure, Simon Chapman’s cinematographer creates the necessary anxiety that nowhere is safe away from a maniac driven by the dark Lord. There’s beauty in the hard contrast with a cooler tone in more lit areas with details coming through greatly in these scenes that warrant them. Skin tones and fabric textures have organic tactile and reflective presence. Both formats are presented in a widescreen 2.40:1 aspect ratio that gives it a tighter yet lengthier exhibition for the high-def resolution. The English audio on the both discs is an encoded lossless DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio and it rocks! Metal is master for the metalsploitation picture with great emphasis on the low-tone and harsh electric guitar strumming while a heavy rock soundtrack, consisting of metal band tracks from Metallica, Goya, Slayer, Pantera, and Machine Head to name a few, is infused with the satanism scenario and Jesse and Zooey’s metalhead lifestyle. Dialogue is clean and clear with prominence above the layers where appropriate, never conflicting with the metal rock. Range and depth play a factor with off-screen action told through key non-diegetic sounds that can almost paint a picture in your head, and this also goes toe-to-toe with the non-diegetic chanting inside the mind/ear of our principal characters because of its omnipresence, which seemingly engulfs the entire space in frame and then some. Optional English subtitles are available. All the special features are encoded on both discs, which is quite unusual for a UHD to have the full list of extras and perhaps suggests a more efficient HVEC compression. These extras include an audio commentary with director Sean Byrne, Into the Fire a new intro interview by director Sean Byrne, new interviews with actor Ethan Embry Those Fragile Things, director of photography Simon Chapman Devil in the Details, editor Andy Canny The Cutting Room, production designer Thomas S. Hammock A Big Step Forward, and Sean Byrne’s short films: “Advantage Satan” and “Work?” Like other limited edition sets from Second Sight Films, “The Devil’s Candy” receives a rigid slipbox with warm illustrated art by graphic artist Huan Do that extends beyond the slip box onto the bi-fold UHD and Blu-ray tall jewel case, a front and center lobby card of six with the rest being images from the film, and the book, a 120-page read of new essays from Aton Bitel, Reyna Cervantes, Becca Johnson, Joe Lipsett, Mary Beth McAndrews, and Zoe Rose Smith. The book also includes production artwork of potential paints, cast and crew credits, and physical media acknowledgements. This is a heavy (metal) set! The UK certified 15 release for strong threat, violence, and language has a region free UHD and a region locked B standard Blu-ray with a runtime on both discs clocking in at 79 minutes.

Last Rites: “The Devil’s Candy” is a hard-rocking, hard-hitting thriller on the cusp of Satanic Panic but submerged fully in dangerous mental illness surrounding the welfare of children.

“The Devil’s Candy” 4K UHD and Blu-ray Is Now Available from Second Sight Films!

The Pangs of an EVIL Movie in “Virgin Cheerleaders in Chains” reviewed!

Posted by Steven Lewis on January 4, 2020

Shane desperately desires to be a part in the making of a low-budget horror movie. Failure after failure of submitting to production studios who opt out rather than option his scripts and the discouraging financial hits with each festival entry, Shane and his girlfriend Chloe decide to venture into producing, writing, and shooting a film themselves. With the script still a work in progress, the promising title alone scores a film crew from his friends and roommates, generate a small fortune of crowdfunded cash, a leading scream queen from the skanky residue poles of a strip club, and a set location provided by a local video store clerk and schlocky indie horror filmmaker named Machete Mike. As the young film crew bumbles through raising more money and the headaches of production woes without a completed script, a demented clan of hardcore snuff and cannibalistic filmmakers seek a hostile takeover of their ambitious endeavor that’ll produce authentic screams and real blood, the very basic foundations of a good horror movie.

You have to admit it. “Virgin Cheerleaders in Chains” is an appetizing, exploitation glazed carrot of a title, a salivating lure that’s hard to ignore for any enthusiast for licentious material. Brazilian born director, Paulo Biscaia Filho, helms the Big House PIctures and Vigor Mortis Apresentam production of an ostensibly horror-comedy that leisurely alters into a slasher-survival-esque structure courted with all the admirations of torture porn with a pinch of homage toward the iconic Sawyer family without a Texas size chainsaw wielding maniac wearing a flesh mask. Blueprinted as a meta-horror with twists and turns galore, “Virgin Cheerleaders in Chains,” by name alone, doesn’t take itself seriously as an inebriated version of the genre it represents and layers to weave a non-linear, outlier story into the heart of the plot, sewn together by the co-producer Gannaway and went in and out of production in 20 or so days to finally hit festival markets a year later in 2018.

While Shane might feel like the focus of the story, Amber and Chloe undercut his presence and steal his thunder as the naïvely ambitious filmmaker with their final girl fight and vengeance. Amber’s the stripper whose yearning for her spot in the limelight no matter how small and she’s portrayed by prominent Manga voice actress Elizabeth Maxwell (“Dragon Ball Super”) and Maxwell is paired with “Last Girl Standing’s” Kelsey Pribilski in Chloe, initially as a mortal enemy toward Amber when the issue arises of the most common, basic, and core division between women – men. Yet, Amber and Chloe dominate the principal antagonists whose subtle quarrels frame an mulishness and aversion relationship build a stronger support for one another when they come toe-to-toe with utter sadism that threatens what collectively matters most to them. Maxwell and Pribilski demonstrate the conventional markings of the popular final girl trope, acting as a single unit, while Ezekiel Swinford bares the helpless victim and ignorant filmmaker, Shane, to be in the crosshairs of death and for the two corners of his semi-triangular love affair to be his saviors. Swinford acts the giddy fool well enough to warrant his character’s witless person in distress calling. Machete Mike lastly, but not at the least, rounds out the core four personas from Don Daro. The “Sex Terrorists on Wheels” actor has little-to-no kindness in his face, marking him intriguing and guileful as the video store clerk whose more than what meets the eye. Ariana Guerra (“Hollow Scream”), Lindsey Lemke, Gary Kent (“Bonehill Road”), Ammie Masterson, Larry Jack Dotson (“Humans vs Zombies”), Kaci Beeler, Michael Moford, Woody Wilson Hall, Ken Edwards, and professional bassist musician in the band Drag, Dominique Davalos “Howard the Duck”), co-star.

“Virgin Cheerleaders in Chains” resembles a movie inside a movie that tries to pull a fast one over the audiences with an open for interpretation of the true nature of events and leaving those once thrilled at firsts sight of the title moviegoers kind of stun like a mouse batted over the head right before being fed to the famished pit viper. Filho and Gannaway’s film does swallow you whole, down it’s gullet, and dropping you right into the stomach acids that begins to dissolve the disillusion of what was imagined from the get-go. Nothing wrong with some slight of hand, but the overall result meanders on the promise of being hyper meta; an attempt to disrupt the conventional and tummy tuck in the tropes from being too loose and obviously exposed. The attempt is well intentioned, but that’s where the summiting the mountain ceases, at attempted, with a great, low-budget desired, premise aimed to upheave the genre and the audience’s expectations, whirl them all into a massive maelstrom, and spit out a “I fooled you!” expose. One aspect that made the grade were the Creeper Labs FX’s Andy Arrasmith and artist Shelly Denning’s special effects work that held a modest candor of blood and severity when the proverbial shit hit the fan. Heads being lopped off, eviscerated stomachs with guts oozing out, and just enough chainsawing and machete work to go around to properly finish the beautifying of “Virgin Cheerleaders in Chains” appropriately.

Rack’em and hack’em those chaste cheerleaders with a Blu-ray copy of “Virgin Cheerleaders in Chains” distributed as the 10th spine from the wild cinema aficionados of Darkside Releasing and MVDVisual. The Blu-ray is presented unrated and in 1080p on a BD-25 with a widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio. The estimated $70,000 crowdfunded budget has a rather aesthetic and sleek digitally recorded imagery, perky with natural lighting and dark tint where appropriate, and is an overall pleasant outcome on a moderately robust budget for indie horror out of Austin, Texas. The English language Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo track maintained a balancing act between dialogue and score where the two fought for priority. Dialogue should always have right of way unless intended not, but for the sake of “Virgin’s” story, there’s doubt that drowning out the dialogue momentarily was purposeful. Bonus material includes Brazilian promotional videos, a behind-the-scenes tour of the Bloorhouse Tour with Gary Gannaway being the tour guide himself, a Machete Mike introduction version of the film, and a 16 page booklet that includes stills, original sell sheet cover art, and the birth of the project penned by Gannaway. “Virgin Cheerleaders in Chains” is meta-sexy, meta-slasher, and meta-fun, but wanders into meta territory a little too long for comfort while still positioning a piecemeal survival horror with fine talent and high kill count.