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Underground > Film, TV & Theatre >

Are you a Hellraiser fan?

12:06 / 17.05.04

I'm going to stick my neck out and say that the artistic talent of Clive Barker manages to eclipse even that of Grant Morrisson. As such, we owe it to ourselves to discuss his work. I realise that sounds rather rash, but I was thinking about it at the weekend when I decided to buy a dvd of Sadomasochists from another dimension aka Hellraiser. (Actually, I bought the first three.)

My fondness for this film is largely down to nostalgia, admittedly, and an early crush on Julia. And the cenobites, obviously, which kinda goes without saying. But even after factoring those elements in I still think that Hellraiser is kinda ok. And, if we are at all sporting and measure by the standards of the genre, then I think it is pretty cool.

I'm curious as to whether it has that same sharp, ripping place in people's hearts as it has in mine. And whether this is one of the films you recite to your loved ones in those intimate, romantic moments - the film is a love story, after all.

Alternatively, we could follow the pattern in the Alien thread and rate the films. So, how would you rank the six Hellraiser films?

13:07 / 17.05.04

six? shit i've only seen three, sorry. number three was memorable for the utterly terrifying cenobite called, i believe, 'CD-head' who's got a little cd tray in his head and will fling a cd at you like a wee frisbee if you're not careful. and another terrifying cenobite called 'cock-tale' or something, that throws slightly combustible beverages over its doomed victims. oh, and let's not forget the terrifying pinhead, who's locked in a pillar and totally useless unless you're stood about six inches away from his face.

i was terrified from beginning to end.

the most memorable that i've seen was hellraiser 2 - lots of shoddy flickering stop-motion animation that really makes you feel sick after a while, makes for quite an unpleasant couple of hours.

terrifying.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

13:21 / 17.05.04

How very odd... only a few days ago I was musing on the fact that I hadn't seen them recently... then my flatmate came home from work with a box set of the first 3! (Not rewatched them, yet, but boy, am I looking forward to it).

The first is OBVIOUSLY a classic. Anyone who says it isn't is quite clearly WRONG and smells of bins.

The second was unjustly panned, imho... I know CB himself wasn't too keen on it, but I thought the big spinning pyramid thing that was Baphomet was a perfect Barkeresque moment.

The third... well, it was kind of fun, I guess... good on its own terms, but seemed to reduce the whole mythos to a Friday 13th/Halloween level of "hey, here's your favourite bad guy! Let's watch him kill some people!" which is all well and good, but seemed to me to go against the tone of the first two.

Mind you, as I say, it's a while since I saw them... so my judgment may be clouded. (Not on the first one, though... memory notwithstanding, I have actually watched it a fuck of a lot of times, so I KNOW it's good. QED.)

Saw I think it was the 5th one a while back... never saw Bloodlines, which looked kind of interesting. Whichever one I saw was pretty piss-poor... had a kind of Harry d'Amour-type private investigator, as I recall... one very good and chilling scene with a female Cenobite rubbing a guy's chest... the camera pulls out and her fingers are actually underneath his skin. THAT was good. All else was a bit poo.

But yeah... the first three, I love, though I have my reservations about HR3. (Pinhead's whole "I AM THE WAY" bit, though, is truly stunning. I remember when that came out at the cinema... myself and flatmates would spend whole acid-laden nights just saying that to each other in ridiculous Pinhead voices. Never seemed to stop being fun.)

14:21 / 17.05.04

My wife and I used to watch Hellraiser on Valentines Day. There is nothign more romantic than murdering random men lured home for sex to help your dessicated lover return to the world from hell so he can kill your husband, who is also his brother. Truely, a testiment to the unshakable power of love.

Didn't care so much for 2 and 3. Some coolness with developing the Cenobite world and all, and occasional bright points, wrapped in awful 80s horror. But I did like Bloodlines. It rewrote the continuity and really didn't fit with the rest, but I thought as a more standalone piece it was mighty cool. The spacestation puzzlebox bit was fantasticly epic.

Didn't even realize there was a 5th and 6th film. Guess I lost interest.

Still, the mythology of the puzzle box, scenes of hooks shooting out of demonic eyes to tear people apart, and "the ultimate experience of pleasure and pain" live on in gaming references, party quotes, and creepy memories carrying far more weight than the movies ever portrayed on their own. Its good stuff. Better by far when you haven't seen them for years, and only remember the good parts

15:03 / 17.05.04

Gambit: You probably aren't even aware of it, but you sound as if you might have reservations about the films. Don't worry, though, I think I get what you are really saying.

Stoatie: The first one needs no comment, but I think you are right that the second is underrated. It is a lot of fun, though the doctor cenobite doesn't really work. His moment of transformation is an absolute classic, however. All in all, the second film has a great start and a less satisfying finish due to some shoddy special effects.

As for the third, it is my least favourite installment. As you say, pinhead became another horror franchise at that point, even if he did have some ok lines. I sometimes get the feeling that they wrote the church scene before everything else and wrote the rest of the film as an excuse to get there. It is clear to me that they didn't have enough pervs on the writing staff.

I think that 3 is my least favourite of the 5 I have seen - even I haven't seen 6...yet - and I'm surprised you didn't like number 5. It had a smaller, less grandiose feel that worked for me and was much closer to what they did with the comics. (Where can I get some of those Hellraiser comics, I wonder?)

cusm: Thats sooo sweet. I myself am determined to get Mordant a Lament Configuration that plays the chimy music for next Valentines.

15:38 / 17.05.04

Remind me... which is the one where we get Good Pre-Pinhead Pinhead vs Bad Pinhead Pinhead? Is that the same one where SPOILERS the box turns into a skyscraper?

I saw the first again recently. It looked old. Like it had been filmed for a fiver. The ideas are still there, mind.

17:08 / 17.05.04

It pretty much was filmed for a fiver, actually. Or at least under a half mil, if memory serves. Very cheap for a non-indy film.

Anyway, order of my preferences would be
1, 2 or 4 depending, then 3 which was FW in comparison. Five and six are so different in tone that they really seem like the Hellraiser mythology is shoehorned in. However, I think they actually do have more of a Barker feel to them than than the third film.

Lurid, I found that the comics really went far afield from Barker in turning Leviathan into an icon of some kind of order/fascism, rather than looking into the aspects of extreme desires or the relationship between pleasure and pain. 'Pretty to look at though.

17:51 / 17.05.04

When I was six my dad had a life-size poster of Pinhead mounted on the wall along the stairs.

Never did go to the bathroom much.

Murray Hamhandler

18:20 / 17.05.04

Lurid: Hellraiser comic collections here, here, and here.

Enjoy.

D Terminator XXXIII

00:26 / 21.05.04

MJ-12 - it was actually something close to, or a bit over, a million. Dollars. Non-adjusted.

[number 5] had a smaller, less grandiose feel that worked for me

Ditto. Provided it's the same one, where - spoiler - this guy gets to relive his horrific day, over and over. And the head-and-arms-only cenobite. It was certainly much better than the first, which telly provided a (painful) glimpse of recently. Ugh. So dated. So utterly devoid of any tension. Some nice bit ideas, though.

The Knights Templar Boogie Machine

09:04 / 21.05.04

My friend has been working the camera on a prototype for a series of hellraiser, but it is unknown at the moment whether its going to see the light of day. I've viewed a few scenes (rapist priest becoming cenobite, ouija board party massacre) and er, were talking possibly a lower budget than the first! Anyway, that aside, it had a good feel about it, though i'm wondering if its being designed to fit into that old dreaded late night uk slot that the horrid war of the worlds and alien nation series used to occupy? *shivers*....

15:01 / 21.05.04

Can anyone provide a one sentence synopsis of the films? I always thought Bloodlines was number three...

09:17 / 24.05.04

Sure.

1. Frank comes back from his wandering days in Hell to be with Julia. They decide to have an open relationship, as long as the other partners are strictly a one time affair. Pinhead gets a crush on Kirsty.

2. Kirsty flirts some more with Pinhead, but isn't sure about going all the way. Julia finds a new lover, Doctor Channard, and converts him to her faith. Their love is tragically cut short as a result of Kirsty's jealousy.

3. Pinhead, heartbroken after the events of the last film, makes a spunky and somewhat evangelical return. After some soul searching, and the ingratitude of his flock, he decides to return to his former self.

4. Past: LeMarchand makes a box with which to entice angels (to some, at least).
Present: Le Marchand thwarts Pinhead in finding freedom.
Future: LeMarchand, twisted by bitterness, murders Pinhead.

5. Man gets to sit in the corner for the rest of eternity, reflecting on how he has been a naughty boy. Pinhead mercifully adds some spice to his new life.

Brigade du jour

04:17 / 05.06.04

You lot are all gits.

Now I'm going to have to splash out more tenners on a Hellraiser boxed set because I haven't seen any of them in about seven years and now I want to see all that weird sick shit again, at like 3am when I need to stay awake.

Again I say, gits.

08:50 / 05.06.04

Well, I splashed out on the boxed set on the strength of this thread alone, and I haven't been remotely disappointed. Go get it!

Brigade du jour

21:29 / 05.06.04

You're not helping my overdraft, Ganesh, you do know that don't you?

Oh go on then, I'll go get it!