Here we go again. As many of my readers may already know, I am one of the last great Hellraiser fans. But since Clive Barker came out of the closet and traded in the gore for some lovely and magical stories about men having sex with each other (a completely understandable literary transformation), the tales of a lonely guy with nails in his face have been put in the hands of filmmakers who just don’t get it.
When Trevor (Dean Winters) and his wife Kirsty (Ashley Laurence) accidentally pitch their car off a bridge, Trevor awakens in a hospital with some movie-amnesia (y’know, the kind that only keeps a patient from remembering plot points). Unable to locate Kirsty’s body, Trevor immediately becomes a suspect in her murder. As Trevor tries to piece together the plot in his head, he discovers he was not the nicest guy around. In fact, it seems he’s been having sex with a lot of different women, not to mention plotting his wife’s murder with one of his co-workers to get her inheritance. So when all of these people show up dead in mildly inventive ways, only Pinhead can explain. As it turns out, Pinhead urged Trevor to open the box so he might get another crack at Kirsty’s soul, but Kirsty’s skill at bargaining once again gets her off the “hook” when she offers up her husband and his accomplices as a trade.
This movie sucks. It’s possible that this movie is worse than Hellraiser: Bloodline (an Alan Smithee joint), but only because that film had unrealized potential. Hellseeker is just a bad movie. Attempting to bring back one of the original characters is indeed a noble venture. But instead of Kirsty matching wits with the cenobites to save her father (who’s been in Hell since 1987), she very casually murders her enemies for personal gain. We are also quick to notice that Ashley Laurence’s acting ability has not improved, and almost certainly worsened over the years. Trevor is not an intriguing character either, but he’s the main focus of the story. Dean Winters was quite good in HBO’s male bonding sitcom, Oz (he’s the one with cancer), but here he lacks any convincing sense of horror. His wife may be dead, he’s thrown up an eel, people are getting eviscerated everywhere he goes, but nothing seems to make this guy look anything but vaguely disappointed. What the first three Hellraiser films all had, regardless of what you thought of the plots, were intriguing main characters played by competent performers. Even the last flimsy installment, Hellraiser: Inferno, had its moments of genuine introspection.
For me, Pinhead is one of the most under-appreciated horror monsters of all time - articulate, intelligent, cleverly dressed, and struggling to escape from his own prison. All this and the power to look up and to the left to make hooks and chains fly out of the floor at his targets. Such is not the case for knife-wielding mental defectives like Michael Myers or Jason Voorhees. But director Rick Bota doesn’t seem to like Pinhead very much. Somehow, his mask got even cheaper looking (it went from four pieces to one in Hellraiser III) and he’s lit so plainly, like he’s just another person, that he comes off as silly. His introductions, championed in the first three films, are completely ignored. Here, Pinhead just kind of shows up and there he is. And then he talks. And then he leaves. In fact, according to Bota’s commentary on the DVD, Pinheads dialogue in which he discusses the backstory was cut because “it would only appeal to the fans” and not the other unlucky bastards who decide to rent this. Well, who the HELL are you making Hellraiser SIX for if not the fans?!
There are a few nods to the source material and some of the supporting cast is pretty good, but not given much to do. The secret lives of pleasure and pain, as well as our human desire to go beyond our limitations are topics vaguely referred to in this film, but they should really be the main focus. Instead, we have what is essentially desperate rip offs from Jacob’s Ladder and In the Mouth of Madness, with cheap special effects and a sort of disdain for anything that might be mistaken for artistic integrity. And nowhere is this more evident than in the soundtrack. Christopher Young’s haunting scores for the first two films, and Randy Miller’s decent attempt for the third are instead replaced by the kind of soundtrack you’d expect from a late-night Skin-emax film - right down to the incessant electric guitar twang.
If they want to keep making Hellraiser films, I’ll keep renting them. It’s my responsibility as a fan. But would it kill them to at least TRY to make an interesting flick? Next time, to do Pinhead some justice, might I suggest taking the route of Wes Craven’s New Nightmare? D-
