Behind the Scenes Awesomeness: The Hellraiser Franchise

Clive Barker (right) next to "Uncle Frank"

Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth (1992)

Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth (1992)

Director: Anthony Hickox

Cast: Doug Bradley, Kevin Bernhardt, Pala Marshall, Terry Farrell

In the Hellraiser universe, continuity doesn’t really matter much. They give you the illusion that there’s continuity because they’ll start with a recap of the previous film, or they’ll mention some character from the previous film, but believe me, it’s all an illusion. In the Hellraiser franchise, each film exists within the universe that Clive Barker created but each film brings its own characters in and eliminates anything established by the previous film. By way of an example, just when you think Hellbound: HellraiserII (1989) is going to give us a bit of continuity because it brought back the character of Julia Cotton, they go and kill her off, eliminating with no amount of respect, characters and situations established on the first film. It seems like the only constant in these films are The Cenobytes and the Lament Configuration. Well, Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth (1992) does the same; it ignores previous films, avoiding any sort of continuity and presents us with an entirely new set of characters. How did this third outing in the franchise turn out?

This time around, the lead Cenobyte a.k.a. ‘Pinhead’ is trapped inside of a sculpture. How did Pinhead end up in a sculpture? Who put him there and why? Never mind these questions because the filmmakers never bother to answer them. You’re asked to accept the fact that Pinhead is a sculpture now and that’s that. It feels like the filmmakers simply said “You know what would look cool? Pinhead trapped in a sculpture! Let’s go with that! I like it!” They didn’t care if this concept made sense or not, or if it fit with what had happened to the character on previous films, they just went with it. Then we are presented with J.P., the owner of a New York dance club called ‘The Boiler Room’. J.P. also happens to be an art collector. One day, while visiting an art gallery, J.P. stumbles upon the sculpture in which Pinhead is trapped in and buys it. Little does J.P. know that he’s bringing ole Pinhead home with him. Similar to previous Hellraiser films, you have to feed the demon in order for it to become flesh. What happens when Pinhead is released from the sculpture?

The idea behind this film is that hell will come to earth. Sounds epic and grand don’t it? This epic premise was a giant red flag for me because if there’s one problem I’ve always had with the Hellraiser films is that they are big on ideas but small on budgets. As a result, even though their concept might be grand, what they actually get to shoot looks cheap. Take for example the premise for this film, what is ‘Hell on Earth’ reduced to in this film? Hell on Earth translates to the main character running through a deserted city street while man holes explode and fire comes out of them, a few windows explode and that’s it; kind of small scale for “Hell on Earth” wouldn’t you say? My point being there’s no grand scope to the concept even though it should’ve been grand. You’re left wanting more, disappointed. Something all Hellraiser sequels do.

Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1988) left us without our favorite Cenobytes. For some reason the filmmakers behind that film decided to eliminate everything that Clive Barker had established on the first Hellraiser film. They killed off all the memorable Cenobytes from the first film, even Pinhead himself! Yet here is Pinhead, alive and kicking on this film. Why didn’t all the other Cenobytes return as well? I guess it was just an excuse to present us with a bunch of new Cenobytes, which sadly are not better then the originals. Let’s see, we get a Cenobyte that kills with the lens of a video camera that pops out of his right eye. There’s a cd spewing Cenobyte which feels so out dated now that CD’s are disappearing. Worst part is that these new Cenobytes are on the film for only five minutes, they are sent back to hell in the blink of an eye…and again you are left wanting. It’s as if they really didn’t think of interesting situations to put these characters in. The main character (a reporter trying to get to the bottom of things) gets rid of the Cenobytes so easily, that you never feel she’s in any sort of peril. And we’re talking about 5 or six Cenobytes with deadly weapons against one human female! It seemed like lazy filmmaking to me, there was no intent to shoot something worthwhile. Cool make up effects do not make a movie my friends. You need tense situations, you need complexities.

Is there anything positive to say about Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth? Well, not really. It feels like a lame-o sequel when compared to the original first film. At least the second one entertained with the ultra gory violence, which by the way is considerably toned down for this third entry. That edge, that feeling of shock, of the forbidden is gone; it’s not on this sequel. There are a couple of cool moments in the film, like when Pinhead walks into a club and the Cenobytes start killing everyone in the club, but it feels restrained. It feels like a wasted opportunity, that whole scene could have been so much more. Okay, I did like those scenes in which Pinhead fights himself. It’s like Pinhead the evil demon vs. the human side of Pinhead, who he used to be before he became a servant of hell. That concept was cool. The film does get sacrilegious at times; there’s a scene in which Pinhead walks into a church and starts bashing down crosses and cackling away like a mad man, but sadly these scenes amount to nothing but having Pinhead pose. The only purpose this film serves is to show us exactly what a cash in is. It kind of makes sense that the director for this film is Anthony Hickox, during the 90's, he was one of the go to directors for cheap horror sequels like Waxwork II: Lost in Time (1992) and Warlock: The Armageddon (1993). Hellraiser: Hell on Earth (1988) proves what I’ve been saying all along about the Hellraiser franchise, that after the first film, all Hellraiser sequels have gone from bad to worse with each consecutive film. It’s a good example of a franchise being treated like a cheap whore and being bled to death.  

Rating: 2 ½ out of 5  

Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1988)

Title: Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1988)

Director: Tony Randel

Cast: Doug Bradley

Review:

Hellbound: Hellraiser II is the first sequel to Clive Barker’s Hellraiser (1987). It was made immediately after the first one became a huge hit in theaters, I'm guessing producers where in a "strike now while the iron is hot!" type of mentality. The success of these films depended a lot on Clive Barker’s personal involvement in them, the less he was involved, the worse the sequel. Still, it's always cool to see other directors play with the concept created by another. For example, on this one we have director Tony Randel playing with the idea that if you dug deep enough, and read the right books, you could end up with something like the Lament Configuration in your hands. That if you wanted it bad enough, maybe, just maybe, you could find the gates to hell itself. Intriguing stuff in deed! So these other directors that tackled the series had a good solid foundation to work with, Clive Barkers imagination is a vast, dark place. He created the basis for a whole universe. I enjoy these first few Hellraiser movies because they are fantasy/horror films for adults; dark, gory, yet retaining a feeling of fantasy to them, that feeling of the impossible, the unreal, the fantastic. The only problem for me with these movies is that its ideas are sometimes bigger than their budgets.

 Welcome to hell!

The concept of a device that opens the gates of hell isn’t all that new, Lucio Fulci himself tackled this premise in The Beyond (1981), Fulci’s best movie in my humble opinion. But, while in Fulci’s The Beyond opening the doors of hell brought forth hordes of flesh eating, maggot spewing zombies, on the Hellraiser films , solving The Lament Configuration means bringing forth The Cenobytes. Beings who enjoy bringing pain into your life, if you desire it badly enough. The Hellraiser films play with the idea that pain and pleasure aren’t really that far apart. That if you have one, the other is not too far behind. It’s a story filled with lust, revenge and betrayal, a story about people willing to kill for their passions.

Hellbound: Hellraiser II starts out with a recap of what happened in the first film. Kristy Cotton, the female protagonist from the first film who ends up sending the Cenobytes back to hell is in a psychiatric institution. She is pretty shaken up by the events she witnessed in the first film. Problem is that nobody believes her stories about demons from another dimension; everybody thinks she has pretty much lost it. Everybody except Dr. Channard that is, a psychiatrist who just so happens to work in the same psychiatric institution that Kristy is staying in. And it just so happens that Dr. Channard is an expert on The Lament Configuration! He is eagerly awaiting his chance to go to hell himself! At the same time, Kristy is set on going back to hell herself so she can rescue her father. Will Kristy ever rescue her father? Will Dr. Channard ever get to experience the dark delights that hell has to offer?

The problem with this sequel is that its story is a muddled mess. This was something that never happened with the original. No matter how crazy things got in the original film, the story always made sense, everything eventually falls into place with the first Hellraiser film. Not so with this sequel. The films main premise is that Kristy is willing to go back to hell to rescue her father from the clutches of the Cenobytes, but unfortunately, the film never really follows that idea to its completion and it disintegrates into something else entirely. Suddenly the film is about Dr. Channards desires to go to hell and become a powerful Cenobyte himself. Suddenly, the film is a stand off between Dr. Channard and Pinhead, battling over who gets to “take over this operation”. So in the beginning, apparently the film is about Kristy rescuing her dad, and then in its second half, it turns into something else entirely, a surreal, nightmarish trip where we get to meet the god of hell, is it Satan? Is it some other dark entity? We never know, the film leaves us in the dark with a lot of its concepts, which is kind of cool, same as in the Phantasm franchise, the uncertainty of not knowing everything keeps things frightening.

Not that I didn’t like the fact that Pinhead is suddenly faced with a little competition. I thought it was cool to have someone challenge Pinhead, and that this challenger is actually a worthy opponent. And the battle does turn into a display of gruesome carnage which any fan of gory horror films should enjoy, but what happened to rescuing dad from hell? This storyline was practically completely dropped from the film, as if half way through somebody suddenly decided to change the story. Apparently, that is exactly what happened. The actor who played Kristy’s dad (Andrew Robinson) didn’t want to return to for this sequel because New World Pictures didn’t want to pay him enough for his services. So he said bye bye to the franchise. As a result of Andrew Robinsons departure, last minute re-writes turned Hellraiser II’s script into the mess that it is. It feels unfocused and all over the place.

The highlight of any Hellraiser film is of course when characters go into hell. And we get quite a lot of that in this movie, half of the film takes place within the labyrinthine hallways of hell. In the Hellraiser films, hell is a series of dark hallways inside of a gigantic labyrinth. Its also composed of a series of crumbled buildings, with many hallways and stairways to get lost in. That’s fine and dandy, and spooky, but what the hell is that floating diamond called The Leviathan? One of the characters explains that The Leviathan is “her god” and that she worships it, but just what the hell is it? This is just one of the many things that don’t make much sense on this film. While watching it you might get the feeling that at some point you are going to get the answers to everything, and that if you simply accept what is happening at some point it will be explained. But that never happens, in fact, nothing of what we see on this sequel is ever explained on any of the sequels. At one point I simply gave up trying to figure things out and simply went with the crazy visuals. On this level, there is some enjoyment to be had with this film. The crazy gory, horror fantasy visuals always entertain and never bore. As you can see, Hellbound: Hellraiser II is an uneven film with many flaws going for it, thankfully, it also has its moments. The story might be a mess, but I personally find the whole Hellraiser mythology interesting. I think this is definitely a series of films that could benefit from a remake. A new take on this universe could try and develop a story that plays with the same mythology but in a more comprehensible manner. But things aren’t all bad with Hellraiser II, it does have its show stopping moments, like the scene where a psychiatric patient cuts himself up with a blade, and the whole sequence where Julia finally escapes from hell, in all her gooey slimy glory. Those scenes with characters coming back from hell without any skin on make me rank this film and the original one as two of the goriest movies of all time. We get to see a little bit of Pinhead's past and who he used to be before he became a Cenobyte, so if anything else makes this sequel special, its because we actually get Pinheads origin story. So while Hellbound: Hellraiser II is not better than the original, it does have quite quite a few sequences that stand out and are adequately surreal and incomprehensible. This film ain't perfect, but it's worth a watch and far superior then the sequels that followed it, which sadly kept getting worse and worse as the series progressed. 

Rating: 3 out of 5