Title: Hellraiser
Describe This Movie In One Simpsons Quote:
LIONEL HUTZ: But I ask you, what is a contract? Webster’s defines it as “an agreement under the law which is unbreakable.” Which is unbreakable.
Brief Plot Synopsis: Millennials learn they might be too old to play with toys.
Rating Using Random Objects Relevant To The Film: 2.5 “Chains of Love” out of 5.
Tagline: “From the master of horror Clive Barker.”
Better Tagline: “They have such sights to peep you, just don’t get yeeted.”
Not So Brief Plot Synopsis: Riley (Odessa A’zion) is a recovering addict and down on her luck. Even so, she’s reluctant when her boyfriend Trevor (Drew Starkey), who drives a delivery truck, urges her to join him in boosting some “millionaire shit” from a warehouse. She probably should have trusted her instincts, for said loot consists of a mysterious puzzle box that sacrifices its user to open a portal for the Cenobites, supernatural torture enthusiasts led by the sinister “Pinhead” (Jamie Clayton).
“Critical” Analysis: David Bruckner’s Hellraiser is the 11th entry in the Clive Barker-spawned franchise (albeit the first true reboot). Like five of its predecessors, it’s also going straight to video/streaming. Unlike any of them, it’s the first to feature a woman in the role of the Hell Priest (Barker is reportedly not fond of the name “Pinhead”).
Depending on how broad your definition of the term is, the new Hellraiser marks the last “iconic” ’80s horror franchise to be fully restarted. Freddy, Jason, and Michael have all had their turn, now the Cenobites are up. The results aren’t as gnarly as we might expect given the originals, and the creators’ attempt to gloss over those aspects means the results are ultimately unsatisfying.
What success they do manage comes from leveraging the plot and characters of the first two movies, which are the best of the series. Visnjic’s Roland Voight is equal parts Frank Cotton (from I) and Dr. Channard (II), while the plot mirrors much of Hellbound, with attempts to access the Leviathan producing the results you’d expect from a bunch of extra-dimensional sadists.
Things start off slowly, introducing the characters and setting the stage for the hell to be raise. The drama between Riley, her brother Matt, Trevor, and the rest slowly gives way to dawning awareness of the stakes, and then the Lament/Lemarchand Configuration starts to get its puzzle game on.
[Another consistent question for all these movies: at what point — after watching one’s loved one dismembered by demonic chains, say — does one stop goofing around with mysterious contraptions? But then, I suppose calling something that actively wants to be solved a “puzzle” box is a bit of a misnomer.]
It’s also a sad fact of life now that horror, like comedy, appears to be a genre fated to debut primarily on streaming/DTV from here on out. And in Hellraiser’s case, it’s not clear a big screen treatment would have helped much. Bruckner does maximize his budget with foreboding settings and interesting Cenobite effects, even if those are mostly free of the bondage gear of earlier movies.
Riley’s proves to be a much more interesting protagonist, precisely because her character is messy, and because several of the subsequent sacrifices (for lack of a better word) are mostly blameless, with less focus on the grotesque and incestuous weirdos of the earlier movies.
Which ends up being Hellraiser’s biggest problem: it’s … kind of bland. There’s none of the weird carnality of the earlier movies, little of the definitive gore that defined the series, and not nearly enough of the imagination shown by Bruckner and writers Luke Piotrowski and Ben Collins in their previous feature, The Night House.
It’s this inability to get weird that ends up sinking this latest Hellraiser, a disappointingly glossy restart of a franchise that ought to be anything but.
Hellraiser is now streaming on Hulu.
This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2022.
