Candlewood

Candlewood brings a local legend to life on a small budget, delivering an entertaining experience that kept me on the edge of my seat! From the opening scene to the end, the cast of creepy oddball characters and the eerie forest and overcast sky set the perfect mood for haunting unease. Along with well-timed, subtle comedy, a string of cleverly placed clues left me wanting to watch it once more to catch every well-thought-out detail. Candlewood stands as a testament to the remarkable power of storytelling, demonstrating its ability to transcend the limitations of budgetary constraints and deliver a great night at the cinema!

I wasn't familiar with the 2025 movie "Candlewood" from director Myke Furhman prior to sitting down and watching it. And the movie's synopsis definitely sounded interesting enough.

While the storyline in the movie wasn't boring, I have to say that I found it a bit confusing, because I didn't really understand what was going on. It felt like writers Joseph Patrick Conroy, Victoria Flores-Argue and Myke Furhman had written parts of the movie independently of one another and without knowing what the others were writing, and the end result was a bit of a disjointed and erratic script. It wasn't really a scary movie at all, so that was sort of disappointing.

"Candlewood" didn't bring anything new or innovative to the horror genre, and it was somewhat lacking in coherency and the scare department, which made for a bit of a dull viewing experience.

The entire cast ensemble in the movie were all new faces for me, which is actually something that I do enjoy whenever I sit down to watch a movie. And I will say that the acting performances in the movie were good.

The movie wasn't rich on special effects. In fact, there was hardly any effects in the movie. Oh, and I absolutely love how the father could hold a shotgun in one hand and fire it without a shred of recoil. I guess the writers wasn't familiar with the physics of firearms.

There are far better and scary horror movies out there, for sure. But I will say that "Candlewood" certainly was a semi-watchable enough movie for what it turned out to be. But it is hardly a movie that warrants more than a single viewing.

My rating of "Candlewood" lands on a generous four out of ten stars.

First of all Lovers Leap is actually above a river, a few miles from the lake.

I think the movie is an insult to the real New Milford. Many of their residents are NYC transplants.

My father came up from Brooklyn, building our house on Candlewood. Stories, legends are actually few. When a person claims a legend, it's generally confined to a story their grandpa made up during a summer barbecue and nobody else within 10,000 miles has heard of it.

So this movie was a stretch for me, but the moviemaker's effort to lay down the plot line, stoke curiosity, or build suspense is truly lacking.

There actually have been a fair amount of drownings by the dam in New Milford, and there are occasions the victims have not been found. I'd never get out of my boat up near the Rocky River pumping area. To be fair, many of the drownings are sadly Hispanic immigrants who are reading the signs and not not strong swimmers to begin with.

There was a man murdered in what we called Calm Cove in the late 1970s , so there is a little bit of true material.

I'm happy to see a Connecticut movie effort, but the only people giving this an 8, 9, or 10, are relatives of the actors or director in my opinion.

Almost all characters are unlikable. And the family dynamic was barely explained and makes no sense, detracting from any sense of plot. Liking the characters and wanting them to be safe is a hallmark or horror films - add in a bad guy or girl who we want to get their due is nice to, but don't kill kids in your movie.

10 minutes in and cannot see one good thing about the acting, poor camera work, dialogue.

Once I saw the cashier's face as the man walked away at the beginning I knew the acting would rival that of a burnt out tree stump. If this took more the the weekend to film, I will be shocked. The property manager gave off severe pedo vibes.

I watched this so you don't have too. I usually love a campy scary movie. This was not it.

It started out intriguing. A blended city family moves to secluded home in woods. Each family member pushing boundaries with the other members of their family. Add legends about the area where they're now living to explain history of haunted land. So much potential to work with.

Then the movie loses the plot. Bad acting and weird special effects made for a long boring movie. It's like the director had a vision, but after 10 minutes got frustrated and quit trying. None of the characters had any redeeming qualities. The "story" had huge plot holes which I don't really care about, I was just glad it was over.