Hellraiser

Hellraiser

A young woman struggling with addiction comes into possession of an ancient puzzle box, unaware that its purpose is to summon the Cenobites, a group of sadistic supernatural beings from another dimension.

  • Released:
  • Runtime: 120 minutes
  • Genre: Horror, Mystery, Thrillers
  • Stars: Jamie Clayton, Odessa A'zion, Drew Starkey, Brandon Flynn, Goran Visnjic, Adam Faison, Aoife Hinds, Hiam Abbass, Selina Lo, Jason Liles, Yinka Olorunnife, Zachary Hing, Kit Clarke, Predrag Bjelac, Gorica Regodić, Vukašin Jovanović, Ivona Kustudić, Greg De Cuir, Miodrag Milovanov, Nikola Kent, Katarina Gojković
  • Director: David Bruckner
 Comments
  • UNOhwen - 3 June 2024
    Is it REALLY almost impossible to make a(t least a semi-)terrific film from Clive Barker's classic?!?!
    If you're older (than a so-called 'millennium') than, I guess...30-ish, there's a pretty good chance you've got (higher) intelligence (than those above), who will think this film's far better than the people NOT fun that group.

    I remember the first film, and I won't pretend it was 'great'; it DID have essential aspects. First, it was directed by Mr Barker, so, at the very least, it got what HE wanted to record as a visual record of HIS story.

    The budget wasn't top-drawer, but despite that, the film cemented the central theme of Hellraiser and how the appearances of the Cenobites would look, especially the main one, who was (unfortunately) nicknamed Pinhead (much to Mr. Barker's dislike). I don't keep up with... well, anything, so I only saw this by happenstance, and (happily?) surprised, said to myself, 'I hope today's CGI can help to give 'bite' to the realm of the Cenobites, as well as other aspects of Mr Barker's POV.

    I DESPISE the idea of 're-boots', in general. To me - someone who's been in the business my entire adult life (and coming from a background comprised of others who worked in it as well), the ONLY purpose of a 'reboot' is to for out paying residuals to any/all parties involved, by rewriting the script, and - other than using the barest of minimal pieces of the original - fashion something new, hire actors who won't demand an outrageously high salary.

    The result is it almost ALWAYS alienates the people who LOVED the original, and if the reboot's successful (that's NOT the same thing as 'liked'), the studio can make sequels, and - if the actors (who appeared in the reboot and) whose performances helped to generate money for the reboot makers) salary requests are... 'too much', they can be chucked (just like the original film's been), and totally 'green' actors can take over (at a fraction of the cost of the reboot actors), and their 'cash cow' just starting to give 'milk' (money). That's why many of these reboots get made - and they seem to be getting made more frequently.

    The only one (who I HOPE) who's come out of THIS reboot (with a LOT of money) is Mr Barker because it's HIS (basic) creation. Otherwise, like rotting garbage, it stinks.
  • gokhann - 15 January 2024
    Gatekeepers rating this low; underrated!
    I want to note that I'm an avid horror genre fan who literally watches at least one horror movie a night. I'm stingy with my ratings and this is one of the best ones out of the 60+ horror movies I watched in the past 2 months.

    First of all, I truly think that people that are downright bashing this and giving it low ratings are those hellbent on the nostalgia of the original Hellraiser (1987). This movie is great, and is a must-watch for any horror fan.

    I thoroughly enjoyed it and wish there would be a sequel to it. I honestly cannot understand why this is rated lower than some much worse horror movies out there. Don't believe the 5.9 it has right now, this is at least a 7.5 but I'm rounding up and giving it an 8 to offset the haters a bit.
  • alexanderpratl - 25 October 2023
    Hellraiser was never intended to be a franchise
    Hellraiser(2022) = 4/10

    Positive:

    -The Cenobites are designed very creatively and spookily. They have been heavily modified compared to the original, which gives them a new and interesting touch. Their godlike and thoughtful nature now comes to the fore even more.

    -The violence is brutal, explicit and creative. Each violent scene captures the Hellraiser vibe and introduces new torture methods.

    -The lore is continued well and you get to know many facets of the Cenobites. Every scene involving cenobites is brilliant.

    Negative:

    -Unfortunately the characters are terribly written. They are stupid, unpleasant and quite annoying. None of their dialogue or interpersonal scenes work and you don't root for anyone.

    -Unfortunately, the Cenobites have hardly any screen time and little dialogue. The fact that they only show up after 1 hour of the film is also a disgrace.

    -The plot isn't even remotely as clever or interesting as the original. Everything seems like standard stuff. Everything in this film has been seen somewhere before.

    -The film has a lot of annoying exposition and everything is solved like a puzzle. Characters explain everything to each other and the dialogues are not natural.

    -The film hardly has any horror/jumpcare scenes, so for the most part it's boring and not really scary.

    -The film is just lame. Too little horror, too little plot and too little suspense.

    Conclusion: The film has a big problem standing out from the crowd. The original was bold, creative and different. This movie is so normal. The exposition is annoying, the characters are rubbish, there are little to no real horror scenes and the Cenobites have too little screen time.
  • underfire35-1 - 27 December 2022
    Hellraiser (2022)
    In 1987 novelist and artist Clive Barker wanted to bring one of his own stories to the big screen making his directorial debut in the process. 'Hellraiser' was born in a sticky combination of sex, violence, incest, religion & practical effects with a gritty grindhouse vibe and tied together by one of Christopher Young's best musical scores. It also introduced the world to the Cenobites, emissaries from of a type of purgatory dimension where pleasure and pain are indistinguishable. Their leader, Pinhead, became an instant horror icon and the film was a box office hit relative to the budget.

    Jump to the present, where everybody is out of ideas so they have decided to reboot the franchise. This new one is not a remake, having a completely different story, but also not a sequel? I don't know. I'll start off by saying that the new 'Hellraiser' is not terrible, but needlessly complicated and fussy about useless details. It follows a forgettable group of characters around as they continually find ways to stab each other with little knives that extend out of the puzzle box which is the key to summoning the Cenobites. Once these gruesome messengers take form in our world, thirsty for the flesh of their prey.. everybody just kind of stands around for awhile.

    Everything could have been solved by putting the box down and not screwing around with it anymore. The plot is fueled by coincidence and bad decisions as it slowly drives to the next unremarkable scene. This includes a plot twist late in the film which creates more plot holes than it resolves but by that point, I didn't really care. Overall this new version is kind of boring, with very few surprises. It looks and sounds like any other horror movie that is being made these days.

    The Cenobites costumes are practical, which is something I guess. The redesigns are weird though, choosing a white / soft red color scheme as opposed the distinct black leather of the originals. This not only makes these creatures less imposing but actually harder to make out on film. A perfect example of this, which also sums up the film as a whole, is the Pinhead makeup. The original concept used nails in the facial prosthetics, giving it a harsher edge. This new design uses long push pins which softens the character, making her less threatening - and yes Pinhead is played by a woman, but you can't really tell and also, who cares?

    'Hellraiser' 22' seems to be a step up from some of the more recent sequels both in money spent and overall concept but doesn't really add anything fresh or interesting. It meanders for two hours where as the original film shot what they could afford, making every scene carry some weight and kept the pacing pretty brisk. Limited resources can inspire creativity but now, there are very few mistakes you can't fix while making a larger budgeted film. Sometimes the mistakes are the best part though. 4/10.
  • Benedict02 - 11 December 2022
    Please... she's already dead.
    The idea of rebooting Hellraiser in 2022 is a bit like injecting botox into a corpse; you can't quite understand what you're meant to get out of it and it's clearly not going to do the worn out corpse any good yet you still persist and want this knackered franchise to be something more than it ever really was in the first place.

    I was initially quite sceptical when I heard about this project (more so when I found out it was intended to be a film and not a series) mainly because the Hellraiser franchise is characterised by two things: ludicrously diminishing returns in the form of its sequels and Doug Bradley performing as the Lead Cenobite. I'm not the biggest enthusiast for this series of movies having only gone as far as to watch three of them and only enjoying them somewhat, with Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth (1992) proving to be my favourite of the first three. I chose to end the series on a reasonable high and not venture into the rabbit hole of sequels. That being said, I had no interest in watching another Hellraiser movie (especially one without Doug Bradley - who was proving to be the only redeeming feature of these films) yet this reboot proved too hard to resist; whether that was the idea of a more true to text Pinhead or the gambler's fallacy that all horror fans are imbued with, I can't quite tell, either way I couldn't keep putting this one off for too long.

    Hellraiser (2022) is on par with either of the first three movies in the original series, in other words, it's nothing special; there are a few really interesting plot points, some nod of approval inducing effects and a rather intriguing antagonist.

    This movie succeeded in that it wasn't as bad as most of the latter entries in the original series, but it simultaneously failed to be anything other than dull since it didn't surpass any of the first three movies - and I'm not the biggest fan of those three films so I don't think I was setting myself a really high bar. It's hard to think of this movie as being any better than its predecessors since it doesn't quite do anything new or unique enough to justify it's existence. Furthermore, the use of CGI over practical effects definitely left me disinterested here since I found that to be one of the stronger suits of the originals. There are also some missed opportunities with the story since the idea of a junkie perceiving their interactions with the Cenobites as drug induced hallucinations is a really fun idea that the film could play with but no sooner is it introduced is it forgotten, and the story only feels like it exists to justify moving the film forward. It never manages to come across as entirely organic.

    It is a rather frustrating watch since the story I was most interested in was Roland Voight's. Goran Vismijc's performance is by far the best in this film as he totally owns every scene he was in and whenever he acted alongside Jamie Clayton's Priest the film's best scenes can be found as everything is essentially built around those two characters. His suffering feels real and even though he's not a good person you do feel for him and when he's battling The Priest you want him to triumph. But then the gang of stereotypes get involved and interject themselves into what could have been a good story of the sadistic art collector paying for his vices while daring to once again summon the uber sadistic demons of deviance.

    I'm not a fan of having a gang of characters all being the lead of a horror movie, especially when their characters are barely one dimensional. The lead (played by Odessa A'Zion) is entirely flat, looking like she's just stepped off of the set of an 80s fitness video while her brother and his boyfriend are a strange caricature of a gay couple who literally read poetry to each other in bed and barely feel real, while you have the random character of the roommate who for some reason follows these three around and of course you have the white trash boyfriend who is in for some reason in league with one of the antagonists to round of the bunch. Each of these characters is beyond frustrating and the lifeless lines of dialogue they deliver just drag the film down and it's so disappointing since when you remove them from the equation the scenes you're left with really stand out and if you'd just committed to a movie based around the collector you could have really had something distinct not just for the series but the modern horror movie format in general. With one lone lead who walks the fine line between protagonist and antagonist hung up against insurmountable odds.

    Ultimately, you were brave enough to try and reboot Hellraiser but you didn't have the courage to try and make it new and different so sadly you've just bottled it.

    Even though the Hellraiser series is dominated by sequels I'd be quite surprised if this movie spawned one - largely because the six configurations of the puzzle box (while a mildly effective if unnecessary edition to the canon) runs the risk of making a sequel feel too formulaic, however, the tease of Roland's evolution of a cenobite could lead to something so much more, most importantly something new and different which (one only hopes) could reanimate this sad corpse of a series.

    If this film manages to lead to a sequel or a series of films centred around the Roland character then I could probably look past some of the flaws of this movie and have some hope for this series. But if that's not the case, as it currently seems, then this was just another Hellraiser sequel destined to be forgotten as the one that was different from the others but not good enough to exalt itself from the other sequels and the stigma of a series that went stale a very very long time ago.
  • deloudelouvain - 2 December 2022
    Not the worst Hellraiser movie but it doesn't beat the original.
    I read a lot of bad reviews on here for this 2022 remake of the 1987 classic horror movie Hellraiser. It wasn't that bad I thought, I actually enjoyed it. The first two Hellraisers were the best. I remember being 19 when it first came out, what resulted in having Pinhead on a poster in my room for years, something my younger sister didn't really appreciate. At that time Hellraiser was just the bomb. Now, 35 years later they give us a new take on Clive Barkers' classic. The story was what to expected, interesting and easy to follow. The gore was okay, maybe it could have been better considering we're 35 years later and the technology seriously evolved, but it wasn't better than the one from 1987, still good enough to please Hellraiser fans like me. The acting was okay as well, nothing bad to write about them. I think people are difficult to please nowadays, always complaining about the most futile things. To tell you the truth there are way worse horror movies than this one so scoring it that low is just ridiculous. From all the Hellraiser movies I would place this one in third place, certainly better than the third and fourth.
  • leonmessyb - 20 November 2022
    Not as bad as people are saying
    I feel you have to look at this movie as a stand-alone movie. Remakes are rarely if ever better than the original movies! So, I think it was way too harsh and unrealistic to compare this movie to the original which was made 30 plus years ago!!! When you saw the original, all the shock factor was new, so now seeing the remake, even if the graphics are a lot better, naturally there just isn't much shock factor. The film by itself is a decent film, keeps you entertaining and invested. The flaws with this film: the main character is highly annoying, selfish and bratty and it's hard to root for her or empathise. Some of the character decisions were so annoying and highly unrealistic. I think the acting generally isn't the greatest but definitely isn't the worst either. The film was decent and worth a watch, especially if you haven't seen the original Hellraiser Movies.