Most people would
probably say I live a lackluster life. My days consist, almost exclusively, of
the following activities: writing, hiking/geocaching, sleeping, listening to
music, working, and watching movies. I
watch a lot of movies. Recently, I’ve
begun holding mini-film festivals for an audience of one where all of the
selections share some sort of common theme. Over the course of several nights,
I’ll settle down with a tub of popcorn and indulge in all the films Quentin
Tarantino directed; or perhaps I’ll treat myself to several days of Asian
horror, classic sci-fi, or 70’s era exploitation flicks. Currently, I’m watching the Hellraiser franchise, all nine movies
viewed in consecutive order. I
distinctly remember seeing the original on the big screen back in 1987, had
vague memories of the second installment, and caught the very end of Part IV on
cable several years back. However, the
other six films are entirely new to me—mainly due to the wariness and mistrust
I harbor toward sequels. What follows are
my thoughts on not only the individual films, but the series as a whole. These aren’t exactly reviews. They could probably be better referred to as
musings. So take them as you will.
Hellraiser: In the 80s, our
horror movie villains mainly came in two flavors: A) Silent psychopaths who stalked and murdered
their victims without uttering a word and B) Wise-cracking maniacs who
punctuated each kill with a cheesy one-liner (which, personally, annoyed the
shit out of me). Pinhead, however, was
something completely different. If you
listen to his dialogue, he’s actually quite eloquent at times. Take, for example, his reply when Kirtsy asks who he and his fellow Cenobites are: “Explorers in the further regions of experience. Angels to some; demons
to others.” In these two sentences, he
not only tells us how the Cenobites view themselves, but how others see them as
well. It also distances them a bit from
the Judeo-Christian trappings of the terms being employed.
Angels
to some, demons to others implies that the Cenobites don’t really belong in
either of those classifications…that such distinctions are entirely left to the
realm of human perception. This leads me
to something else I found refreshing about Pinhead and his bizarre crew: they
weren’t the embodiments of evil. Yes,
they did horrific things to those who summoned them; but their intent wasn’t
necessarily evil, per se. If anything,
the Cenobites were amoral more than anything else. They existed in a realm
where right and wrong were foreign concepts; there was only the pursuit of
pleasure, even if that pleasure was found in the most extreme forms of
sadomasochism imaginable. Which brings me to my final thoughts on the original
movie; I also loved that the tortures they employed weren’t designed to
punish people. The Cenobites weren’t agents of divine
retribution; the people they inflected suffering upon sought them out. When Frank Cotton tries to buy the puzzle box
at the beginning of the film, it is freely given to him, accompanied by the explanation,
“Take it. It’s yours…it always was.”;
this seems to imply that certain individuals are called to the box, that their
destinies are inexplicably intertwined. When Kirsty inadvertently solves the
puzzle box, Pinhead’s explanation is simple cause and effect, as if it was
fully expected that the person summoning the Cenobites knew exactly what they
were doing: “The box… you opened it. We came.”
Hellbound: Hellraiser II As
far as sequels go, this wasn’t an entirely horrible film. I liked the surrealism of some of its scenes
and thought its depiction of “Hell” as a labyrinth was really cool. I put Hell in parenthesis because at this
point in the overall arc of the series, the Cenobites still aren’t exactly
demonic, which—as previously stated—is something I really enjoyed about the
first movie. We see evidence once again
that the realm the Cenobites reside in calls to a specific type of person, in
this instance Dr. Channard, who was obviously obsessed with Cenobite lore. Frank
Cotton is being punished, true, but there’s a certain logic to his imprisonment. He escaped the Cenobites in the first film, essentially
rejecting the “pleasures” they offered, though his dialogue indicated these
tortures weren’t entirely unwelcome: “
The Cenobites gave me an experience beyond limits... pain and
pleasure, indivisible”; “Some things have to be endured. And that makes the
pleasures so much sweeter. “ For
turning away from them, he is punished with an eternity of frustration in a
manner which is reminiscent of classical Greek mythology: a lustful man tempted by erotic women he can
never touch, devoid of both the pleasure and pain he rejected. In other places, however, the internal logic
between the two films breaks down. For example, when Dr. Channard resurrects Julia
from the bloody mattress she died upon, she comes back as a hideous,
corpse-like creature. That’s fine. After all, that’s what happened with Frank in
the first film. Dr. Channard then begins
to offer victims to Julia to help restore her to a human form, just as she had done
for Frank in
Hellraiser. When the time came that Frank needed a skin,
however, he had to kill his brother and harvest his, the end result being that
he looked like Larry Cotton . So why
then did Julia look like Julia after it was time to get her skin? Another piece of faulty logic that bugs me is
when Dr.Channard uses the mute mental patient, Tiffany, to open the puzzle box
while he and Julia watch from a hidden room. The Cenobites are prepared to take
Tiffany when Pinhead stops them, stating, “It is not hands that call us, it is
desire.” This is a double-edged
sword. On the one hand, it reinforces
that the Cenobites come for those who desire what they offer; but in the first
movie, Kirsty inadvertently opened the puzzle box while toying with it. Though she lacked the desire, they were
prepared to take her anyway, believing that she must have known what she was
doing. Besides internal logic, I also didn’t
particularly care for the Channard Cenobite. His lines came too close to the
wise-crackery I mentioned in the opening paragraph and, overall, I found him to
be a rather uninteresting monster.
Hellraiser III: Hell On Earth I
didn’t like Pinhead’s characterization in this one at all. He was portrayed in a more stereotypical evil
fashion, complete with diabolical laughter, the desecration of a church, and
even the claim that he exists to force humanity to recognize the darkness in
their hearts. When investigative
reporter Joey watches a videotaped interview of Kirsty Cotton in a mental
hospital, Kirsty says she can only describe the creatures as demons…despite the
fact that she consistently referred to them as Cenobites in earlier films. While I did feel that debaucherous nightclub
owner JP Monroe was the type of person who would be drawn to Pinhead, I thought
Pinhead’s seduction of Terri—who up until that point was portrayed as a rather
tragic, naïve character—was too easy. I
also cannot stress this next bit enough:
I
hated the new Cenobites
Pinhead created toward the end of the film.
Strike one: they were simply too gimmicky. Strike Two: The original Cenobites were
hideously deformed in ways that implied extreme body modification and radical fetishism. The pins which gave Pinhead his name and the
female Cenobite, who basically had a vagina carved into her throat, are prime
examples of this. These new ones though felt more like cyborgs than anything
else. Strike Three: the Doc Cenobite had cheesy one-liners. My feelings on that have already been made
clear. All in all this was a really
disappointing movie.
Hellraiser: Bloodline I have
mixed feelings about
Bloodline. As a standalone, it’s a really good
movie. The acting was much better than
in the previous sequels and I liked that the plot spanned millennia. Plus, the wrapper story was set in space
(anyone who knows me, or has read my work, knows that I have a special love of
that borderland where sci-fi and horror intersect). In addition to this, the newest Cenobites
have returned to the repulsive naturalism of the originals. However, my beloved Cenobite mythos—amoral
explorers into the further regions of experience—was shot to Hell. The Cenobites are now expressly referred to
as demons and enmeshed in Judeo-Christian trappings. No longer called by
specific types of people, they seek to open a permanent gateway to Hell. While
I did enjoy a lot of the dialogue between Pinhead and the Princess (is it just
me or does that sound like a bizarre children’s book?), he spoke with intimate
knowledge about how Hell had changed since she left. So intimate, in fact, that if not for the
other films, one would naturally assume he was an eternal demon who’d personally
been there with her. However, she was
summoned and trapped centuries before he was ever created. So that’s why I’m torn: I enjoyed the film immensely, but have
seen—and liked—so many other movies about demons trying to open a portal to
Hell and it pained me to see the more unique aspects of the underlying
mythology changed so blatantly.
Hellraiser: Inferno There
was a lot to like about this movie. It was very dark, surreal, and contained
film noir overtones which appealed to the classic movie buff in me. As a crooked cop who rationalizes adultery
with prostitutes as a means of keeping his marriage alive, Joseph Thorne is
also the type of person that would be drawn to the puzzle box so the
consistency there was nice. While Pinhead’s screentime is limited in this film,
the Cenobites we do see are exquisitely fetishistic; but , like a good burlesque
act, you only get hints and glimpses without really being able to take
everything in with a lingering stare. They also embodied the pleasure/pain
principle in ways not depicted in the previous films. Rather than simply
elevating pain to the point that it is indistinguishable from pleasure, the Wire
Twins (as I later learned they were called) blend the two in manners that aren’t
quite as extreme as Pinhead’s hooks and chains.
Speaking of Pinhead, his characterization in this movie changes once
again. No more the diabolical demon, he
now seems to take the role of guiding condemned souls to self-realization, exposing
their sins so they have an understanding of why all of this is happening to
them. While this depiction still shows
the Cenobite leader in a Judeo-Christian light, I didn’t find it quite as
annoying as the fully demonic manifestation in the last couple films. To be
honest, my mind kept drawing comparisons to the ghosts in Dickens’
A Christmas Carol...without, of course,
redemption at the end. In my opinion
this is one of the better films in the series
Hellraiser: Hellseeker I
thought this movie was similar to
Inferno
in a lot of ways. Once again, we see
Pinhead in the role of “guide”, there
are surreal breaks in reality, and also a mystery element to the plot. It wasn’t quite as dark as
Inferno, however
, and the other Cenobites depicted in it were literally forgettable…
I’m writing this less than twenty-four hours after watching the movie and
really can’t recall anything about them, so much so that I’m now
second-guessing as to whether or not there actually
were any other Cenobites in the film. I have to admit that I got
kind of excited when I saw Ashley Laurence appear in the opening credits; I
thought the return of Kirsty Cotton might also indicate a return to the original
film's Cenobite mythos, but alas this wasn’t to be. Something I didn’t like was how
easily Kirsty acquiesced when her husband demanded she open the puzzle box. She knew all too well what would happen once
that box opened…and yet she did it anyway. The argument
could be made that it was all part of her master plan; but the way
the scene was played made it seem as though her deal with Pinhead was a
spur-of-the-moment act of desperation. This line of thought, though, does
confirm that other Cenobites were present in the film. I remember them being with Pinhead in this
scene, but I still can’t recall anything about them. This wasn’t a horrible film. It was much better the
Hell on Earth, but not quite as good as
Inferno. All in all, I
thought it was a “middle of the road” kind of movie.
Hellraiser: Deader
Initially, I thought this was the weakest subtitle I’d ever heard. Within the first fifteen minutes, however, I
understood exactly what was meant by the term and that prejudice was wiped
away. I found the concept of the cult
highly intriguing and thought Amy Klein was a much more interesting reporter than
Joey Summerskill from
Hell on Earth. As a whole, though, I thought the movie came
across as somewhat muddled. I still don’t
understand what gave Winter LeMarchand the ability to bring the dead back to
life. If you take the series as canon,
his ancestor didn’t possess any special powers; he was simply a toymaker who created
the puzzle box. While I knew that LeMarchand was waging a war he could not win (to use Pinhead’s words) I also wasn’t entirely clear on what the goal of
this war was until I read a wiki for this movie. The acting was good, it had an interesting
premise, and a few particularly chilling scenes; it’s just a shame that it didn’t
live up to its full potential.
Hellraiser: Hellworld The
best thing I can say about this movie is that Lance Henriksen was in it. I like
Lance Henriksen. But even he couldn’t redeem
this travesty.
Hellworld felt more like a teen slasher flick, complete with
attractive young people being picked off one by one, a car which wouldn’t start
when our heroine was trying to make her escape, and that same heroine fleeing
into the woods. The movie adhered so much
to slasher film standards that I even knew which two characters would still be
alive at the end, due to them refusing the alcohol offered by the party’s host.
I also didn’t like the way the movie made references to the previous films as
films; I understand what the filmmakers were doing with it, I just thought it
came off as kind of cheesy. Especially
when you bounce back and forth between “are these films based on something
real?”, “no, they’re not.”, “oh wait, yes they are.” Definitely my least
favorite of the series. But I’m wasting
my breath. This film can actually be
summed up quite succinctly by a quote from Lance Henriksen’s character: “It’s
like a bad horror movie, isn't it?”
Hellraiser: Revelations I
don’t understand why so many people hate this film. I’ve heard it referred to as “a piece of
garbage”, “witless”, and “dancing on the grave of a cinematic classic.” In my opinion, however, it took the series
back to its roots. The Cenobites here
are the same amoral “explorers” from the original film; they’re not out to
punish the wicked, open a permanent gateway to Hell, or any of the demonic hokum
that’s plagued previous films. If any of
the sequels danced on
Hellraiser’s
grave, it would be
Hellworld; the
plot of
Revelations was tighter than
Deader, the Cenobites more integral than
in
Hellseeker and
Inferno, the scope more refined than
Bloodlines, and the acting far superior
to
Hell on Earth. Yet, I hear that
Revelations makes the other sequels look
good in comparison. Sure, it was kind of
strange seeing someone other than Doug Bradley in the role of Pinhead, but I
cannot fault an entire film simply because an actor didn’t play a role with
which he’s become synonymous. The
argument can’t even really be made that Bradley captured “the essence” of
Pinhead since the Cenobite leader’s characterization throughout the sequels has
fluctuated so wildly. Reviewers also
consistently point out that the movie was made quickly and cheaply to ensure
that Dimension Films didn’t lose their rights to the franchise. I’ve seen
a
lot of films made quickly and cheaply, but this one honestly didn’t look like a third-rate
B-film quickie. As indie filmmakers
consistently prove, you don’t need massive budgets and mind-blowing CGI to make
an effective movie. When the puzzle box is opened, it doesn’t crackle as electricity
zips around it like in previous installments, but I actually liked the light radiating
from within it better to be perfectly honest.
If the Lament Configuration serves as a doorway between dimensions, it
makes sense that the box would glow with the same light that spills through
cracks in the walls when the Cenobites are summoned; and this otherworldly glow
makes the opening of the box far more creepy in my opinion.
