Hellraiser (1987)

I’ll watch horror films and I do enjoy them but I must admit I’m not a huge fan of gorey stuff and will turn away from the screen if it looks like something a bit gross is going to happen. So with that in mind you might think it’s a bit odd that I’m reviewing Hellraiser as that’s all about pleasure and pain and, well let’s face it. skin-ripping torture.

I was reminded I’d not seen this film for quite some time after watching a stream of the demo game of Hellraiser: Revival which is due out in October and boy was that game’s opening sequence something! I honestly didn’t think you could put that level of violence in a video game but I guess I’m a bit out of touch with the horror genre in general.

But it got me thinking, compared to this new version of Hellraiser, what was the original film like? Was it massively gorey like the new game? Does it actually explain the lore of the Cenobites so I can figure out what the story’s all about and would it hold up for a modern audience who might be discovering the Hellraiser franchise for the first time?

Side note: Did you know there are ten films in the original Hellraiser series? TEN! I thought there was only 2!

What’s Hellraiser About?

We start the film with a man in need of a bloody good manicure. He’s in the process of buying a very ornate looking box which he takes home and tries to open. It’s one of those puzzles boxes where you have to press things and twist bits in a certain order so you can pop the next step of the puzzle open.

After playing with the box for a while, the man slowly begins to solve it and as different parts pop open it begins to glow and emanate blue lightning. When the final sequence is complete and the box opens, several chains fitted with hooks on the end appear out of nowhere and pierce the man’s skin. He lets out a scream as he’s ripped apart but it’s not clear whether this is in pleasure, pain or both.

We then cut to a nice suburban house (more on that later) where Larry (Andrew Robinson who is fantastic as Garak on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine) and his wife Julia (Clare Higgins, The Worst Witch – 2017-2020) are moving in. It turns out this is Larry’s family home (more on that later) and he’s trying to persuade Julia the move is a good idea, especially as she’ll be on “home turf” (more on that later).

Julia reluctantly agrees and the couple move in, only for Larry to badly cut his hand when trying to manoeuvre a bed upstairs. Looking for help, Larry finds Julia in one of the attic rooms and he’s bleeding so badly from his hand the blood is dropping over the floorboards.

Unbeknownst to the couple, this is the place where our box-fiddling man died at the start of the film and Larry’s blood finds its way to some of this man’s remains and begins to rejuvenate the random parts of his ripped up body that ended up wedged under the floor boards.

It turns out that the man with the box was Frank, Larry’s brother, and he has an extremely dark side to him — one that not only involves playing with magic puzzle boxes that invoke other-worldly demon Cenobites but also seducing his sister-in-law. Lovely bloke.

The blood that Larry spilled in the attic is only enough to partially restore Frank and he needs more in order to fully regain his human form. Time isn’t on his side as the Cenobites will soon realise he’s missing from their torture/pleasure (whatever floats your boat, no kink shaming here) realm.

While Julia agrees, somewhat reluctantly, to help Frank due to her infatuation with him, what lines will she cross in order to make her lover whole again? Who is she willing to sacrifice to bring him back into her arms (and bed) and will the Cenobites find Frank before he can be restored?

Location, Location, Location

After I’d watched the film I was really rather confused.

Not because of the plot or the writing but because of some of the choices that were made with the setting and the characters.

As I mentioned earlier, we really need to discuss the house which is the focal point of the entire film.

Clive Barker (the writer and director of Hellraiser) knew he would need to keep the budget limited, especially as there are some quite intricate special effects shots, so he decided that he’d set the film in one location: Larry’s family home.

This is all well and good until you start examining the location of said home, the people living in it and the guests invited to enter it.

Barker was struggling to get any financing and finally landed a deal with New World Pictures (owned by Roger Corman) and was greenlit a budget of $900,000 (just over $2.6million in today’s money). In order to make the money go as far as possible they filmed in and around London with a mainly British cast and crew.

The two notable exceptions were Larry and Kirsty played by American actors Andrew Robinson and newcomer Ashley Laurence respectively.

The house chosen reminded me quite a bit of the home that features so heavily in The Amityville Horror (1979) with the attic windows overlooking everything like all-seeing eyes. But despite its resemblance to a classic horror home, it’s distinctly English. The house just oozes suburban England, as do other exterior locations used in the film — the famous Battersea Power Station is visible in one scene further tying the location to London.

And if to confirm we’re in Blighty, as they’re checking the house out for the first time, Larry says to Julia “at least you’ll be back on home turf” and then in another conversion with his daughter Larry says that he’s happy he’s not in Brooklyn any more.

So every single sign is pointing to the events portrayed as happening in England, specifically an unnamed London borough.

Except a load of the characters have been over-dubbed by American actors, most notably in a scene where Larry and Julia are hosting a house warming/moving in dinner where every character bar Julia has an American accent.

Now, I must admit I am not an expert on Londons various boroughs and while I know there are some that skew towards a particular group I have yet to hear about a massive settlement of Yanks here on our fair shores that roam around London in New York Yankees baseball caps or attend random dinner parties.

It turns out that while shooting in London with a British cast kept costs low, the production company thought that all of those Limeys would hurt the film’s chances at the American box office and so dubbed over the majority of the British cast with American vocal talent.

I do wonder what Robert Hines, who played Kirsty’s love interest Steve, thought when he went to see a screener and heard another voice coming out of his mouth.

Anyway, this isn’t a reason to knock off points for the film it just took me out of it quite a bit as I was left wondering where we were and why there was such an odd mix of Brits and Yanks in such a small area of the world.

Low Budget Doesn’t Mean Low Effort

Spoilers ahead — you have been warned!

Given this film is from 1987, and given the budget was under $1 million, the effects in this film are fantastic.

The Cenobites, including the iconic Pinhead who became the literal face of the franchise, are on screen for less than 10 minutes, but the level of detail in the makeup is amazing.

The same goes for Frank’s resurrection scene and then subsequent skin/muscle/tissue regrowth after each kill. These are all fantastically done with practical effects and work really, really well and while they probably look a bit cheesy to a younger audience I think they can definitely hold their own with some of the low-effort CGI that gets shoved into modern films.

One effect that was a let down was the final “boss Cenobite” fight scene when a Cenobite bursts through the front door to attack Kirsty and tries to take the puzzle box from her. The thing looked like an upside down prawn with arms, but the arms were thin and scraggly and I did laugh out loud at one point and yell “Demon Chicken Arms!” at the screen which is never a good sign.

The Puzzle Box Creates More Puzzles

The film doesn’t really explain who the Cenobites are, what their ultimate purpose is (other than to cause pain), who it allowed to obtain the puzzle box or where it came from.

I know not everything needs and answer but when your film centres around a lore object like the puzzle box I feel some explanation is due to the audience (as long as it’s not shoehorned exposition).

And I do like a film that leaves us with more questions than answers as long as at least some questions are tackled by the film.

As it stands we don’t know how someone finds out about the box — or even why they’d seek it out in the first place.

With Frank I am assuming it’s because he feels as though he’s sampled all of the pleasures that can be obtained by “human flesh” — whether that be sex, drugs, perversions or making others complicit in his perversions which he can also derive pleasure from.

But how did he get to the box?

Did someone rock up to Da Club™ and suggest it to him? And if so why not also suggest he clean his nails first?

Then we have the wishy washy explanation of what the Cenobites are: They might be seen as angels or demons depending on your view.

But demons deal out punishment, angels deal out love and while you can argue that pain and pleasure might be two sides of the same coin, I don’t think sin and salvation are.

And given the extremely limited time the Cenobites are on screen for we don’t understand the world they inhabit, how they got there or how the box even allows them to cross over into ours.

I had just as many questions at the end of the film as I did at the start.

But maybe that’s the point.

Maybe it’s not just Clive Barker, in his capacity as both writer and director, leaving loose ends because he doesn’t know the answers himself. Maybe it’s because the Cenobite’s are personal to each of us.

Pinhead says that some call them Demons and some call them Angels and so therefore we all have our own meanings and desires stemming from the Cenobites.

And as for whether their realm is heaven or hell? Well, I guess you could argue, given the state that the world has been in for the last 40+ years, are any of us worthy of heaven anyway?

Watch this if you’re not too squeamish and don’t mind mentally dubbing every character with a Cockney accent like they’re in an episode of Eastenders because their American accents make no sense.

Where to Watch:

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