Hellraiser: Judgment

In the world of horror, there are some people who have changed the genre completely through their fantastic ideas and designs. What would the world of horror be without legendary directors such as George A. Romero, Tobe Hooper, Wes Craven or Dario Argento ? These names, and many others gave us cult classics that will always live inside the horror community. No matter how many years go by, their classic films still capture that cinema magic we all love to experience. In 1987, a man named Clive Barker, released his film Hellraiser ( based on Clive Barker´s novella The Hellbound Heart ). A British horror film that looked very different from anything else. It was a very disturbing film, where a puzzle box opens the door to an alternate dimension of pure hell. I have to say, since this was the directorial debut from director Clive Barker, he did a really good job with this film, considering the budget was only around 1 million dollars. The make up effects in this film looks really good, and the list of people who worked on this film is amazing. The character known as Pinhead ( played by legendary actor Doug Bradley ) is one of the most Iconic horror characters in movie history. Hellraiser was appreciated by horror fans, but not all movie critics. Of course that would not stop them from making Hellbound: Hellraiser II. This time the film was directed by Tony Randel ( known as the director of Godzilla 1985 ). The film was actually not bad, and he did manage to capture the style and brutality of Clive Barker´s world of Hellraiser. Of course more sequels were on the way, so in 1993 we got Hellraiser III: Hell On Earth. It was after this film that the Hellraiser franchise started to fall apart ( except for Hellraiser: Inferno, pretty good after all ). Doug Bradley continued as Pinhead in a number of sequels, but the magic was gone. Every sequel just kept on using Pinhead as a trade mark, but left out the style of Clive Barker. At it seemed for a long time that Hellraiser was doomed, for all eternity. Until i watched the trailer for Hellraiser: Judgment. A new film directed by Gary J. Tunnicliffe, the man who worked make up effects on the first 3 Hellraiser movies. I could tell by the trailer he wanted to bring back the classic style of Hellraiser. Do we finally have a worthy Hellraiser sequel, or is this another shitty attempt to milk money out of fans ?

In Hell, Pinhead ( Paul T. Taylor ) and The Auditor ( Gary J. Tunicliffe ) are discussing how to adapt their methods of harvesting souls, now that advancing human technology is making the Configurations ( gateways to Hell ), gradually more obsolete. On Earth, three detectives Sean Carter ( Damon Carney ), David Carter ( Randy Wayne ) and Christine Egerton ( Alexandra David ) are on the hunt for the serial killer, known as " The Preceptor ", whose murders are based on the Ten Commandments. A connection to one of the victims, leads Detective Sean to look into Carl Watkins ( Jeff Fenter ), a local criminal who went missing near the abandoned residence at 55 Ludivico Place. Sean go here all by himself, as he looses consciousness, and wakes up in the Stygian Inquisition´s domain in hell. He is questioned by The Auditor, before he will know his verdict. But the Angel Jophiel ( Helena Grace Donald ) tell them to let Sean go. On his way out, he steals one of the puzzle boxes. Sean have not realised, that with this cube, the Cenobites haunt his personal life, and could destroy his life if he actually open the box.

I am happy to say, we finally have a decent Hellraiser sequel in our hands. Hellraiser: Judgment is a step into the right direction. It is of course nowhere near as good as the original film, but compared to many of the sequels, i have to say that they have done a pretty good job. First of all, the idea of punishing people for their sins, is a good idea. No matter what you did, be prepared to be judged. The brutality for the sinners is one of the details i think makes this film more interesting. Every chosen one will be punished brutally. Every Hellraiser sequel have tried to tell different stories, and in more recent seuqels i feel that you did not care about the films. Basically because they failed to capture the essence of Clive Barker. Now, Hellraiser: Judgment may not capture his world as much as we would like to see, but i can sense that this is still a film that tries to find the classic concept of Hell with Pinhead and the Cenobites. Pinhead is of course no longer played by Doug Bradley, so this time actor Paul T. Taylor takes on this legendary character. Doing this classic character just the way Doug Bradley did it, is of course almost impossible, but i think he did do a pretty good job portraying Pinhead. We have other characters here as well worth mentioning. We have legendary make up artist, actor Gary J. Tunnicliffe as The Auditor. This is one of my favourite characters of this film, His look, and his dialogue makes you curious about his background. Nice to see legendary actor Heather Langenkamp in a cameo as well. The other characters works for the most part, even if you would like to see some more creatues from Cenobites. Director Gary J. Tunnicliffe have taken his job seriously, and have clearly tried to please the fans of Hellraiser. Even if the budget is limited, he manage to use some of those classic chains flying through human bodies, and even a face ripping scene. The ending is one of the problems i have with this film, it felt too easy and not very interesting. But we should be happy, Hellraiser could finally be back on track again since the year of 2000, and it only took about 18 years. If there is another film coming, i could actually be excited to see it. Give this film a chance, if you are a Hellraiser fan. 

Rating: DDD