SYNOPSIS
Candy, a beautiful young painter (ABBIE CORNISH), is in the first throes of love with Dan, a sometime-poet (HEATH LEDGER). Their love intoxicates, like Paradise, like Eden: they care only for its increase, for the abandonment to pleasure. In heroin, they find the limitlessness they are seeking. Their future together is invincible.
Soon the lovers have nothing left to hock. So Candy sells her body. Dan lets her, and imperceptibly they cross a boundary on the way out of Paradise. As the grip of their habit grows they renew their lover's vows through marriage. Their big day passes in a drug-induced haze of bliss. Candy's parents (TONY MARTIN & NONI HAZLEHURST) are bewildered. They watch their daughter slide into something they agonise over but cannot name.
As the days and nights roll on, Candy and Dan's addiction becomes inseparable from their commitment to each other. They are ensnared in a lover's double bind. Their beloved Casper, junkie professor, wayward mentor and exuberant host, watches them with clear-eyed vision. But his knowledge is bittersweet. Casper is the most sophisticated drub buddy you could imagine: he is also an addict.
As the marriage spirals, so does Candy's mind. Her rage at their dream-gone-bad drives a wedge between the lovers. She surrenders to the chaos and goes into rehab. Separation is humbling for Dan. Apart from everything he loves, he gains a newfound clarity. He understands that Candy, like him, has been granted a reprieve.

PRODUCTION STORY: GENESIS
The genesis of the film Candy lies in the Australian novel of the same title by Luke Davies. The award-winning novel quickly garnered a cult following in both Australia and Europe. Producer Margaret Fink came across it not long after it was first published in 1997: "When I read it I recognised a film writer and knew I wanted to work with Luke."
Wishing to move away from the film (My Brilliant Career) and television adaptations (Edens Lost) that had garnered her such high regards as a film producer, Margaret Fink approached the novelist to develop another kind of film with her. When Luke Davies responded with the idea for a comedy musical, Margaret took his proposition and a copy of the novel 'Candy' to director Neil Armfield - "to introduce him to Luke's talent". Neil and Margaret had previously collaborated on the acclaimed three-part mini-series Edens Lost and Margaret was keen to work with him again, "He's a remarkable director". In the event, Neil fell straight for 'Candy' and that was the beginning of the film.

DEVELOPMENT
If Neil burned through the novel - "It had such life" - the process of adapting and developing the script was more measured. Writing stretched over the next six years from 19999-2005 while Luke and Neil juggled other projects as novelist/poet/screenwriter and director respectively.
Luke had already sketched out a preliminary adaptation when Margaret invited Neil on as script editor. Before long Neil's contribution was deemed so intrinsic that he became co-writer. Neil, "The particular nature of our collaboration is that Luke is very detail-minded and quite obsessive, and I'm detail-minded but lazy. Luke would obsess and keep the written record of everything we did. We would bounce lines and ideas around. Occasionally I might act something out, improvising the dialogue and Luke would write it down. It was quite a joyful process, and out of it, we became friends."
"We were constantly trying to address the question of why the novel should be a film. What can we enrich from the incredible story that is the novel? It was interesting how superbly Luke was able to detach himself from the personal experience that had informed much of the story and convert it into the third person. That was a process he'd already reconciled with in writing the book, but the film was like another level of separation and transformation."
Writer Luke confirms, "The novel is a typical fist novel: thinly veiled autobiography. Autobiographical in the sense that I was involved, that I lived in that world for a time rather than that the lead character is me. After all, when I wrote it my loyalty was to the structure of the fiction not to the events of my life. Working with Neil fictionalised the story even further….Even so; certain key things remain that have a basis in my personal life, that are deeply felt."
With Neil now working as a writer on the script, Margaret introduced John Collee, co-writer of Peter Weir's Master and Commander, as script editor to the project. Margaret,  "John's first question was 'What is Candy about?' Off the cuff I said, 'It's a love triangle with a hero, a heroine and heroin.' He liked that. Actually it's a hard question. Any film dealing with complex human predicaments is hard to express in one sentence. But at heart, beyond even the story of addition, this is a love story."
John Collee came on as script editor and his brilliant grasp of screen narrative structure and storytelling was germane in transforming the script from the more episodic style of the book. Luke, "John is very, very perceptive about matters of structure and story turning points. It may not be that we took on every suggestion, but what we did, was gold. He was so challenging that he prompted us to think in new directions which was extremely healthy for the story."
As the script began to develop a life of its own, elements of the novel were lost, replaced or embellished. Writer and producer bother credit Neil with the idea of elaborating and amplifying Candy's parents who occupy a single scene in the book. Luke, "I think what attracted Neil to this story is what lay behind it: the wider realm of family interaction. Family is what he loves to explore and Candy's parents grew as a result of that"
Neil, "I have never had a substance addiction but I am fascinated by the energy that burns from people that do. I was also interested in the silence that surrounds addiction - which is such a taboo in society. However, for me, the parents were a key point of entry into the story. I was interested in drawing out Mr and Mrs Wyatt as two good people who have, never-the-less, contributed to the pain and dislocation that their daughter is obviously suppressing. I wanted to suggest this dynamic without being simplistic, without saying this kind of parenting produces this kind of child. I also wanted to convey the power of their love.  I think in Tony Martin and Noni Hazlehurst's performances you get a strong sense of their love but as it is formed and distorted by their own middle class aspirations - their sense of what is right or appropriate - and their difficulties in communicating."
Another character that sprang into great life in the screenplay was the junkie professor and deviant mentor figure of Casper as played by Oscar-winning actor Geoffrey Rush in this film. Neil, "There's a line in the film, 'Casper and I go way back' which Dan says in the voice over. Well, Geoffrey and I go way back too. We started working together in the theatre in 1980 and he's been my most regular collaborator ever since. I'd always wanted to work with Geoffrey in a film. Casper was a character Luke and I dragged out of the book and recreated with Geoffrey's voice in mind."

CASTING
The filmmakers were looking for a young angel to fill the title role of Candy. Luke describes the character as "this unsettling mix of strength and fragility with a wild, dangerous edge to her energy."
Abbie Cornish had been on producer Margaret Fink's radar since she first saw her in the Australian drama series Wildside in 1997 when the young actress was fourteen. When she finally met her in 2000, Margaret was sure they'd found their title role. However there were other contenders and Abbie Cornish was still very young: younger than the character of Candy. Between that first meeting and being casting 2004, Abbie gave a powerful, much-lauded lead performance in the award-winning local feature film Somersault.
The turning point for Neil was finally getting actors Abbie Cornish and Heath Ledger together in a screen test. Neil: "I realised that there was a very precise working energy between them - and a chemistry. It was fantastic. When I saw Somersault I realised that Abbie is a carrier for emotional intelligence, that she has a depth of soul that the camera almost caresses. Her onscreen power is amazing."
The filmmakers' estimation was rewarded by Abbie's performance as Candy. Neil, "She brought a very deep sense of love to the story. And when she lets go in the third act of the film and reveals the character's emotional breakdown, she's astonishing. Like Heath, she has an inability or refusal to be dishonest. Abbie and Heath knew that as a lead in a film you have to take responsibility for your own centre, and they both did that quite magnificently."
However when Luke first suggested the possibility of Heath Ledger for leading role Dan, Neil had some resistance. On Neil's mind was the extreme fallibility of the character. As Neil expresses it, if Dan is "a man spun around and dazzled by the beauty of the world", he is also someone "prepared to allow his partner the humiliation of selling herself in order to fuel their addiction." The director felt "Heath's natural energy is heroic. I thought we needed someone grubbier or edgier for Dan." It was Heath's revelatory performance - dark, culpable, vulnerable - in Monster's Ball that converted the director. After a meeting in Prague, where Heath was working on The Brothers Grimm, Heath accepted the role.
Geoffrey Rush, for whom the part of Casper had been specially developed, had been involved in the project since early days. As Luke puts it, Geoffrey was generously "hovering at the fringes, giving feedback which affected the writing of Casper….Someone of that calibre attached gave a wonderful feeling of security, a senses of 'Oh, we are on a good path here!" Of Geoffrey's eventual performance, Luke adds, "He brought to the character such a sense of tragic depth and sadness…while retaining the feeling that he's still just this little boy who wants s to be bad, use drugs, and play with the kids…a sense of mischief."

PRODUCTION
Four years in, Margaret Fink sought a partner producer to work with her to finance and develop the film. In this capacity Emile Sherman (Rabbit Proof Fence) of Sherman Pictures joined Candy in what Margaret describes as a "very fortuitous and happy union." Emile comments that result was the most enjoyable partnership in his film career. Additionally, the opportunity to work with Neil Armfield carried a strong sense of anticipation. "He's probably Australia's most respected theatre director. He brings the expectation of the highest level performances with him - and he certainly delivered on that expectation, creating a wonderfully cinematic and poetic film in the process."
Keen to imbue the production with the DIY (do-it-yourself) energy that has characterised his creative life in the theatre, director Neil attached many of his seasoned theatre collaborators in key production roles. These included Robert Cousins in his film debut as production designer, Jodie Fried as wardrobe designer, and Paul Charlier as sound designer and composer. Garry Philips (Getting Square, Better Than Sex) came on a cinematographer and Dany Cooper (Battleship Galactica, Angel Baby) as editor.
Production began on March 17, 2005 and continued over seven weeks entirely on location in Sydney's Inner West, the Eastern Suburbs and in Wallacia and Austral in regional NSW.
Screenwriter Luke Davies whose novel 'Candy' began the whole process, found a role in production making a cameo appearance. His screen debut, for which Neil insisted he audition, is as the Milkman who, memorably, hands the young lovers free cartons of milk in the re-dawn dark. Appropriately, Luke has called the making-of-film he shot concurrently to the main production, Diary of a Milkman.
Of the original vision that inspired the film and in tribute to his co-writer/director Neil Armfield has remarked, "Luke is, of course, a poet, (as well as a novelist), and in the shooting of Candy I have tried to retain that sense of the poetic. In one sense, the whole story is a kind of dream vision, and the door that opens at the very beginning of the film is a door into another universe or world."
Neil continues, "Through the process of making the film, the story became ever clearer, more essential. It can be distilled down to the question 'what really is love?' This is a challenge Candy's father, Mr Wyatt, puts to Dan at the end of the film when he says 'Whatever you're capable of. Whatever she needs'. That is the moment when Dan realises that love, real love involves sacrifice."

Neil Armfield Writer and Director
One of Australia's foremost directors, Neil Armfield is currently Artistic Director of the internationally renowned Company B, at Belvoir Street Theatre in Sydney. Neil has directed for all of Australia's state theatre companies, Opera Australia, the Welsh National Opera, and The Bregenz Festival in Asutria, Zuric Opera, and Canadian Opera. English National Opera, Lyric Theatre in Chicago and the Royal Opera House, London. Theatrical highlights include the world premiere of The Eighth Wonder for the Australian Opera (1995); premiere of The Blind Giant is Dancing for Lighthouse Theatre Company (1983); Company B's Hamlet and The Diary of a Madman starring Geoffrey Rush which toured to Russia in 1991, and the world tours of Cloudstreet in 1999 and 2001. More recently, Neil has directed The Lieutenant of Inishmore and The Underpants for Company B Belvoir, The Marriage of Figaro for Welsh National Opera/Opera Australia and Sweeny Todd for the Lyric Opera of Chicago and Royal Opera House in Convent Garden London.
Neil is a recipient of the Sidney Myer Performing Arts Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Performing Arts and the Sydney Theatre Critics' Circle Award for Significant Contribution to the Theatre. He has won many Green Room and Sydney Critics' Circle Awards for Best Director, and in 1991, he received a three year Australian Artists' Creative Fellowship. He has also won two Helpmann Awards. International awards Neil has received include Best Production, Dublin International Festival of the Arts for Cloudstreet. His production of Billy Budd was co-winner of the Barclay's Award in London and received a record six Dora Mavor Awards including Best Production and Outstanding Direction of a Musical in Canada in 2001.
Neil's film credits are Twelfth Night and the Castanet Club. For television he has directed Eden's Lost with Margaret Fink as producer, and Coral Island and Fisherman's Wake as part of the 'Naked' series for Jan Chapman and ABC Television.
"Candy" takes the paradox that the most attractive and desirable things in life can also be the most dangerous. What is attractive about Candy is that she is prepared to go all the way. When she shoots up for the first time and nearly dies, her reaction is 'Lets have some more'. There is something irresistibly sexy about risk.  Tasting the illicit, playing with the devil, underpins the story of Candy. It's this that can give shape and pressure to our apparently bland lives but it is the very thing that can destroy them as well.
"Luke and I have attempted to get under the social skin of what addiction is. At the heart of the film is the suggestion that junkies are you and me. Dan and Candy, who have a great gift for life, are attempting what all of us do - to make the wonderful things in life stay alive and to banish the dull bits. But there is also a mythic idea behind the story: that heroin addiction is a crime against nature. It comes from the desire to make time stop. If life is a pattern of highs and lows, Dan and Candy have become addicted to the highs. The problem with this is that you start to force everything artificially up, and in the process you die - because there's a natural patter of a give and take, of rise and fall that we have to learn to live with."

Luke Davies Writer
Luke Davies is the author of two novels, the cult bestseller Candy, and Isabelle the Navigator. He has also written numerous books of poetry. Of these, Absolute Event Horizon was short listed for the National Book Council Poetry Prize; Running With Light won the 2000 Judith Wright Calanthe Poetry Prize at the Queensland Premier's Literary Awards, and Totem won the Grace Leven Poetry Prize, the Age Poetry Book of the Year and overall Age Book of the Year in 2004. The same year Luke was also awarded the Philip Hodgkins Memorial Medal for Poetry. His novel Candy was short listed for the 1998 NSW Premier's Awards, and Luke was a Sydney Morning Herald Young Writer of the Year in 1998.
Luke has a cameo in the film as a milkman, and has directed the 'making-of documentary', Diary of a Milkman. Luke is currently at work on his next novel, his next volume of poetry, a play for the Sydney Theatre Company Blueprints Program, and a film (as writer/director) being developed through the Australian Film Commission's Indievision strand.
"Writing with Neil was a joy. I wanted to work with this guy who had such an extraordinary reputation in Australian theatre. My hopes were borne out by the experience. Neil is a master of character and economy. I had already written an initial draft and that, rather than the novel, was our working document. From there it was a five-year slash and burn operation. The novel was dominated by interior monologue, by the narrator's slightly deluded headspace. In the script we were dealing with three-dimensional characters. We let the truth of these characters guide us. Neil expanded the original cast into the circle of family - family is what he loves to explore - and that's when the script was transformed, when it really began to blossom."
"It seems to me that Neil has made this very sad, very tight film, an absolute diamond of a film, everything stripped back to the central core - which is, at heart, a love story."

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