new hellraiser movie review

The 2022 “ Hellraiser ,” the horror franchise reboot, often resembles an artful and over-produced tribute to “Hellraiser,” Clive Barker ’s kinky and sometimes genuinely nightmarish 1987 shocker. The halting pace, scattered focus, and potent ghastliness of Barker’s movie reflects its nature as Barker’s feature directorial debut, a decent adaptation of his 1986 novella The Hellbound Heart .

Watching the original “Hellraiser” still feels like happening upon a profane, if by now familiar, event. In that movie, Barker introduces readers to the Cenobites, a race of God-like sadists who threaten their human victims with sensual experiences far beyond their (or our) tired understanding of pleasure and pain. The new “Hellraiser” evokes Barker’s original adaptation in the same way a good cover song recalls its source material: with love, intelligence, and an inevitably crushing sort of redundancy. Nobody really needs “Hellraiser,” but it can sometimes be fun anyway, especially if you haven’t seen “Hellraiser” in a while.

This “Hellraiser,” made 35 years and nine sequels after the original, feels dutiful and staid where Barker’s version reflected his unique sensibility and preoccupations. The cleverest additions to the “Hellraiser” canon will only be apparent to established fans since the makers of the latest movie awkwardly graft a sometimes-inspired monster movie onto the back of a trauma-focused character study. Riley (Odessa A’zion), a grieving former addict, runs into the Cenobites while chasing after her missing brother Matt ( Brandon Flynn ), who previously scolded Riley for sticking with her sketchy boyfriend Trevor ( Drew Starkey ).

Director David Bruckner (“ The Night House ,” “ The Ritual ”) and co-writers Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski ’s devoted retread does not, however, meaningfully connect the Cenobites with Riley or her character-defining certainty that she’s the target of forces that are well beyond her control. She’s right, of course, and so is Matt, who disappears soon after he and Riley have a bad falling out. They argue about Riley’s erratic behavior, which really means her relationship with cavalier Trevor, who drinks around Riley despite her being participation in a 12-step program.

Neither Trevor nor Matt’s relationship with Riley develops much over time (it’s 121 minutes long, people), since so much of the plot concerns the arrival and eventual disappearance of the Cenobites. They chase after Riley because she steals and accidentally unlocks a gilded puzzle box. But Riley only steals the box, which horror fans will instantly recognize as a way of summoning the Cenobites, because Trevor encourages her. Riley also only further entrenches herself into the Cenobites’ story—which connects the box with its previous owner, the elusive rich guy bohemian Mr. Voight ( Goran Visnjic )—in the vain hope that mastering the box will bring Matt back to her.

The remaining characters in this new “Hellraiser,” including Matt’s boyfriend Colin ( Adam Faison ) and Riley’s roommate Nora ( Aoife Hinds ), only have personalities enough to react to whatever circumstantial peril arises from Riley’s quest for answers. That general lack of personality wouldn’t be so bad if there wasn’t so much dead air throughout—seriously, one hundred and twenty-one—which mainly gives viewers time to wonder who exactly these new Cenobites are and why their opaque personalities now have all of the charm of well-restored hand-me-downs.

Granted, the Cenobites’ redesigns make them look appropriately unnerving and they are thoughtfully presented here as inter-dimensional sharks who establish their reflexive cruelty by lazily circling about Riley and her friends. Bruckner, who’s already confirmed his reputation for effects-driven shock scares in his two previous features, confirms that again here with a few memorably upsetting moments. (I did not expect to see a REDACTED enter REDACTED’S REDACTED.)

Bruckner also confirms what his strong, but not-all-there previous feature, “The Night House,” suggested as far as his casual indifference to character and narrative continuity. Even the agonizing dispatch of Serena ( Hiam Abbass ), Voight’s weary assistant, seems inconsequential since her personality is neither reflected in establishing scenes nor in her seemingly interminable showdown with the Cenobites. It’s always nice to see Abbass pop up in English-language productions, but the poor woman can only do so much with a supporting character who’s more of a prop than a person.

Still, there’s a chance you’ll enjoy Bruckner’s “Hellraiser” if you’ve seen or care for Barker’s “Hellraiser.” This updated version doesn’t hang together very well from scene to scene, and it doesn’t really enhance Barker’s original character concepts, which were really only ever great plot suggestions to begin with. But there are, however, enough pleasurable callbacks and suspenseful moments to keep you waiting expectantly for something to happen.

On Hulu today.

Simon Abrams

Simon Abrams is a native New Yorker and freelance film critic whose work has been featured in The New York Times , Vanity Fair , The Village Voice, and elsewhere.

Odessa A’zion as Riley
Jamie Clayton as The Priest
Adam Faison as Colin
Drew Starkey as Trevor
Brandon Flynn as Matt
Aoife Hinds as Nora
Jason Liles as The Chatterer
Selina Lo as The Gasp
Zachary Hing as The Asphyx
Goran Visnjic as Voight
Hiam Abbass as Menaker

Writer (screen story by)

Ben Collins
David S. Goyer
Luke Piotrowski

Writer (based on the book by)

Clive Barker
David Bruckner
David Marks

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The new Hellraiser’s gory fun only cuts skin deep

Actor Jamie Clayton successfully resurrects Pinhead and a hit-or-miss horror franchise

by Katie Rife

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A close of up Jamie Clayton’s Pinhead aka the Priest in the new Hellraiser, with her skin peeling away being held up by pins

Making one of the better Hellraiser movies isn’t all that difficult, to be completely honest. Any franchise with more than three or four entries is bound to be uneven, but Hellraiser’s drop-off is particularly sharp, going from a sequel that improves on the original ( Hellbound: Hellraiser II ) to two movies that aren’t good , exactly, but are quite fun to watch ( Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth and Hellraiser: Bloodline ) to a long run of direct-to-video sequels so bad, the series starts to look like a meta-joke where pain is being inflicted on the audience instead of the characters. And yet, for nearly 35 years, fans have remained devoted to 1987’s Hellraiser and Clive Barker’s diabolical vision.

Director David Bruckner is one of those fans. That’s clear watching his new reboot of Hellraiser , which doesn’t go back to the source material, exactly, but does remain loyal to its spirit. The heroes of this straight-to-Hulu film are dirtbags, queers, and addicts. The tone of the movie is very serious and adult, a welcome pivot from teen-centric slashers like Scream (2022) and Bodies Bodies Bodies. The occult art deco production design blows the original’s puzzle box up to awesome architectural size. The Cenobites inspire a breathtaking combination of wonder and terror, soft-spoken and luminescent under the pale moonlight. And the chains... oh yes, there are chains, flying in every direction and ripping human bodies apart like bags of milk.

Still, Bruckner’s priorities, and those of screenwriters Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski ( The Night House ), are somewhat different. While the 2022 movie has an omnivorous sexuality that feels right for Hellraiser — we see both gay and straight couples naked in bed together, and there’s more male nudity than female — this version is less kinky than Barker’s sadomasochistic original. In that film, the promise of an eternity spent on the knife’s edge between pleasure and pain held a perverse fascination. Here, it’s an unequivocal evil, with no appeal for anyone except for the Cenobite leader, billed here as The Priest (Jamie Clayton), and her minions. Even Hellraiser ’s depraved billionaire (and there simply must be a depraved billionaire) regrets his adventures “in the further regions of experience.”

The puzzling Lament Configuration box sits on a austere table

Instead, Bruckner and company get off on franchise lore. This film fleshes out the world of the Cenobites in new and comprehensive ways, laying out exactly how the Lament Configuration (i.e., the puzzle that summons the Cenobites) works and the seven steps a penitent must go through in order to request, as the film puts it, “an audience with God.” Each of these steps requires a human sacrifice, and Hellraiser buys itself time by having its protagonist figure this out and deliberately draw out the intervals between these bloody offerings. It’s here that the film starts to lose focus.

Hellraiser opens with a title card that reads “Belgrade, Serbia,” which replaces Morocco as the global capital of taboo delights. There, the Lament Configuration is purchased and brought back to Voight (Goran Višnjić), the decadent billionaire referenced above, who promptly sacrifices a young man to it and summons the god Leviathan. Fast-forward six years, and the box sits abandoned in a shipping container in an empty warehouse. Then 20-something degenerates Riley (Odessa A’zion) and Trevor (Drew Starkey) “liberate” it while searching for valuables they can sell for quick cash.

The couple met at a 12-step meeting, but simply handling the box pushes recovering addict Riley off the wagon. Here, Bruckner’s film reaches for a more realistic tone, placing the Hellraiser universe in something that more closely resembles our world than anything in Barker’s original. The subsequent argument between Riley and her more responsible brother Matt (Brandon Flynn) similarly grounds the film in down-to-earth conflicts and settings — until the arrival of the Cenobites turns a public park into a surreal nightmare, and Matt inexplicably vanishes.

Overwhelmed by guilt and grief, Riley goes out searching for clues about the puzzle box she suspects might have caused Matt’s disappearance, briefly launching the film into a procedural plot it should have followed through to the end. Instead, it shifts focus once Riley breaks into Voight’s Massachusetts mansion, with Matt’s boyfriend Colin (Adam Faison) and their roommate Nora (Aoife Hinds) following close behind. There, Hellraiser pivots from a mystery into a siege film, as the group barricades themselves inside Voight’s palatial home while the Cenobites gather outside.

A cenobite with flayed skin and a flat head enters from the darkness in a mansion room

This chunk of the film highlights Hellraiser ’s two biggest weaknesses: the characters and the length. The film earns most of its two-hour running time, but Riley bringing the rest of the gang up to speed on what the hell those things are and what they want burdens Bruckner’s reimagining with a few too many dialogue scenes during an already slow stretch of the film. And aside from the fact that she has a brother and a weakness for booze and pills, we know relatively little about Riley. We know even less about her friends — a moment of silence, please, for poor Nora, who has no distinguishable character traits except for being “the roommate.” That makes it difficult to engage with the drama between the characters, about which even the film’s writers seem indifferent.

Perhaps appropriately, the most compelling figure in the film is a Cenobite. Of the five actors who have put their mark on the infernal bureaucrat colloquially known as Pinhead, Jamie Clayton is the only one besides Doug Bradley to really embrace “Pinhead” as a character. Clayton’s version is breathier and more feminine than Bradley’s authoritative priest figure; she’s more of a holy mystic than a pope-king. Her black eyes look at the humans begging for mercy in front of her with the cold curiosity of an alien scientist, and she waits patiently for them to come to her with regal posture and delicately folded hands. Clayton’s Pinhead is a different, quieter type of frightening, which makes the voluminous dialogue she delivers in the film (far more than Bradley in the 1987 movie) rather ironic.

The Cenobite design in Hellraiser is excellent all around, taking advantage of advancements in prosthetics to scrap black leather fetish gear in favor of suits made out of their own flayed skin. Familiar characteristics are exaggerated — the female Cenobite’s throat folds have never looked so vaginal — and new designs evoke the horror of iron lungs, cleft hands, and human taxidermy. The film is bloody and intense when it needs to be, at one point following a pin through a character’s throat and out the other side. But its most inventive horror flourish is built into the sets, which shift and clank into place like the pieces of the Lament Configuration when the Cenobites are near.

Hellraiser 2022 easily clears the admittedly low bar of being one of the best Hellraiser movies. It’s the best one since Hellbound: Hellraiser II, and might even be the second best in the series after that film. It has some great, grotesque visuals, which makes it a real shame that this film isn’t getting a theatrical release. And it accomplishes what many fans (including this one) wanted for the series, which was to pull it out of the creative purgatory where it’s been stuck for a couple of decades now. The only thing to fret about at this point are the points where Barker’s kinky edge has been sanded down for a more sex-averse era, and his enigmatic storytelling scrapped in favor of exposition that’s more legible, but less compelling. Beyond that, the suffering is exquisite.

Hellraiser will be released on Hulu on Oct. 7.

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Hellraiser (2022) Review

The hellraiser franchise gets a much-needed facelift..

Hellraiser will be streaming on Hulu on Oct. 7, 2022.

David Bruckner's Hellraiser is an excitably reverent retooling of Clive Barker's original horror classic and the author's novella, The Hellbound Heart. Writers Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski take David S. Goyer's story treatment into alternate realms of sensual punishment, far from Kirsty Cotton's encounter with the Lament Configuration. Barker's Hellraiser favors ‘80s horror tendencies of a more stripped but graphic nature — Bruckner's able to expand storytelling and scope, going with a "bigger" mentality that still writhes with infernal carnal pleasures. It's respectfully indebted to Barker's psycho-sexual confrontation of eroticism and violent punishments. Yet, Bruckner never attempts to retrace what Barker's already colored outside typical horror lines — Hellraiser 2022 thematically raises hell on his newly renovated terms.

Odessa A'zion stars as Riley McKendry, an early-20s addict trying to cleanse her habits with a 12-Step Program. Brother Matt (Brandon Flynn) is her loving but overbearing housemate, who chases her out after another night when Riley stumbles home drunk after seeing new boyfriend Trevor (Drew Starkey). That night wasn't just tainted by substance abuse, though — Riley and Trevor steal an ancient puzzle box that Riley unlocks after ingesting a few pills. In a drug haze, she's visited by The Priest (Jamie Clayton), this cross between angel and demon with pins stuck into her smooth head. She warns of the box's hunger for blood and what it demands, which begins another Hellraiser tale where humans are shown sights they cannot comprehend — gory sights that flay, pierce, and strip away skin.

Clayton is a harbinger vision as Bruckner's The Priest (aka Pinhead), introducing repulsively chic new Cenobite forms. Gone are the black leather BDSM costumes; pale cadavers with exposed muscle tendons are like peeled underworld bananas. Effects artists Josh and Sierra Russell reteam with Bruckner after The Ritual and The Night House to bring concept designer Keith Thompson's Cenobites to life, honoring favorites like "The Chatterer" with the instruction to ensure silicon suits could handle mobility. There's nothing lost with Cenobites covering more ground, acting as hunt-and-stalk creatures throughout Berkshires manor grounds. From The Masque (Vukašin Jovanovic) with his flesh-stretched facial canvas being where his head should be to The Gasp (Selina Lo), an extreme upgrade to a prior Cenobite dubbed "Deep Throat,” Bruckner's extradimensional beings appear as wishmasters exiled from heaven and accomplish looking revoltingly seductive while breathing new life into the franchise.

The way Clayton nods to original Pinhead actor Doug Bradley is evident in stoic mannerisms, but Bruckner’s The Priest separates itself thanks to Clayton's performance. She saunters with spectral grace and gazes through characters as she curiously questions their darkest desires. Maybe "philosophical" isn't the right word, but close? Clayton's inquisition as The Priest is appropriately unsettling — her voice echoes an ethereal reverberation as she remains stone-faced while sniveling mortals plead for mercy. She nails the higher-power allure of Cenobites who grant box users the ultimate pleasures they seek, blurring the lines between fear and excitement to unspeakable depths.

What's your favorite horror remake?

Meanwhile, A'zion shines as the flawed addict trying to do better who still cannot deny momentary impulses. Everyone's endangered because Riley can't say “no”: Matt, Trevor, Matt's sweetheart boyfriend Colin (Adam Faison), and their other housemate Nora (Aoife Hinds). A'zion explores the trials of addiction and who gets hurt in the process, using the choices Riley is forced to make when the box starts claiming souls. In proper Hellraiser fashion, the performances of A'zion and Clayton are key — The Priest says as long as Riley possesses the box, fates are in her hands. Riley asks for repentance, howls in agony, and transitions between countless emotions that A’zion executes with emphasis that pours out of the screen.

Elsewhere, Hellraiser 2022 transforms the sex dungeon aesthetic of Frank Cotten's attic into something vastly more marbled and elaborate. The box has six shape-shifting configurations, granting the props department freedom to redesign each geometric evolution. Goran Visnjic portrays the film's Frank-iest character Roland Voight, leaving behind his estate dedicated to decadent pleasure-seeking that eventually becomes important to Riley's unholy plot to vanquish the Cenobites. Hellraiser favors more of a puzzlemaker's oddity, benefitting from movable labyrinth houses like in Thir13en Ghosts or even escape room horrors. Bruckner digs into the godless worship of those corrupted by the box's possibilities despite its proven harm, which sometimes does too much within its a bit too bloated duration — yet exemplifies how reboots can thoughtfully recontextualize and rebirth iconic franchises.

Surprisingly, Bruckner — responsible for grotesque bodily mutilation in his Southbound segment "The Accident” — doesn't meet the extreme practical gloopiness of 1987's Hellraiser tortures. The Cenobite's first claimed target doesn't even earn a euphoric end on-screen. The filmmaker's psychologically driven dread found in The Night House plays into wonderfully trippy moments where Cenobites appear from randomly materialized tunnels or stress the regret that weighs on Riley — not the violence itself. Although, gore still exists between exposed Cenobite wounds and mechanisms that, for example, tug on wearers' nerves strung through moving gears that continually cause nagging pain. Hellraiser is more dazzling than it is sickeningly sadomasochistic through slimy gore effects as a stylistic differentiation that leaves Barker's bloodletting untouched — nor is the tone as poisonously randy.

Best Horror Movies So Far In 2022

Hellraiser is a soulful revival of a soulless horror legend that never tries to oust Clive Barker's original. Director David Bruckner — alongside writers Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski — examines Hellraiser's themes with spectacle styles through addition. Jamie Clayton is the Pinhead a new generation deserves, awash in Bruckner's colder cinematography that stashes redder lighting to signify humanity is where true monsters reside. Hellraiser might be comparatively less grotesque, but a heady calibration of "pain or pleasure" storytelling brings Hellraiser 2022 screaming with glee into a reinvigorated ready-to-franchise configuration. It's cleverly calculated by saving gore for maximum impact and valuing the psychological edginess inherent in Cenobite storytelling, never getting lost in gooier intentions just for masochistic midnighter distractions. There are developments that feel slighter and less explored even at almost two hours, but that doesn’t stop Bruckner from delivering one of the best Hellraiser films since the original.

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Then again, the “Hellraiser” films never were worth a whole lot on that score. Pinhead , the series’ solemn S&M ringleader/aesthete/guru (that white bald head of his, with its chessboard lines and perfectly ordered rows of pins, is like an art installation), became, over time, a kinky Freddy Krueger figure, an unholy mascot of megaplex fear. But who remembers, or cared about, the people he infected with his virus of pleasure-pain?

In the new “Hellraiser,” Pinhead — more properly referred to as the Hell Priest — arrives with the Cenobites, a team of fellow ghost demons who lend new meaning to the phrase “exposed body parts” (one has a spine laid open as if somebody were performing surgery on it). One of the Cenobites saunters around like a space-alien geisha, one is like a robot with the Nun’s rictus-grin jaws, and one resembles a Francis Bacon portrait of a mouth frozen open in mid-scream. As for Pinhead, he’s been reconfigured as a soft-creepy-doll version of himself, with star-child eyes and a voice of sexually ambiguous velvet. That the Hell Priest is now played by an actress, Jamie Clayton, takes the movie, in some ways, closer to the spirit of Barker’s novel. Yet as Pinhead and his fellow specters skulk around, the movie turns them into such a precious set of creature-mascots that I half-expected to hear someone say, “Collect all five.”

The film stops dead in its tracks whenever they aren’t on screen, as the only plot seems to be Riley’s desire to get her brother back after he’s absorbed into the cosmic painsphere. Trevor, who may know more than he lets on, says things like, “How did you get it to change, like from the cube into that ?” He’s talking, of course, about Lemarchand’s Box, the engraved mechanical puzzle box that has always been the emblem of the “Hellraiser” series — it unlocks pain from pleasure, leading your soul into a new world. In “Hellraiser,” even the tricky logistics of the box are, in a way, a metaphor. It starts off as a cube that, if you click the right knobs and spin the correct corners, exposes and rearranges its hidden parts, at which point it’s no longer square. Just the way you’re no longer square once you get a taste for kicks that have been twisted into forbidden shapes.

The new “Hellraiser” works as metaphor, as flesh-annihilating spectacle. Yet it doesn’t work as a story. And maybe that’s because there’s now something quite dated about the film’s vision of pain-freak sensuality as a one-way ticket to the inferno. The film wants to take you to hell and back, but these days that sounds like something you’d find on a hook-up app.

Reviewed online, Oct. 4, 2022. MPA rating: R. Running time: 120 MIN.

Production: A Universal Pictures release of a Spyglass Media Group production. Producers: David S. Goyer, Keith Levine, Clive Barker, Marc Toberoff. Executive producers: Gary Barber, Peter Oillataguerre, Todd Williams.
Crew: Director: David Bruckner. Screenplay: Ben Collins, Luke Piotrowski. Camera: Eli Born. Editor: David Marks. Music: Ben Lovett.
With: Odessa A’Zion, Jamie Clayton, Adam Faison, Drew Starkey, Goran Visnjic, Hiam Abass, Brandon Flynn, Aoife Hinds, Jason Liles, Yinka Olorunnife, Selina Lo, Zachary Hing, Kit Clarke.

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‘hellraiser’ review: stylish visuals and ample gore cover thin story in classic ’80s horror revival.

David Bruckner ('The Night House') directs this reboot of the venerable Clive Barker franchise, premiering on Hulu and starring Jamie Clayton as the first female Pinhead.

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Prior to reviewing the new installment in the long-running (35 years!) Hellraiser horror movie franchise, I did my due diligence. I rewatched all 10 prior films, from the acclaimed 1987 original and its 1988 sequel through the ensuing two theatrical and six direct-to-video entries. Throughout the marathon, I took copious notes, careful to track the characters and plot developments through their many permutations.

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Hellraiser Reviews

It may be the third-best Hellraiser movie, but you really have to have seen fifth-through-eleventh best to know what a relief that is.

Full Review | Original Score: 6/10 | Jun 23, 2024

In David Bruckner’s 2022 renditionof Hellraiser, things change. He has no intention of remaking the same film and goes with his own screenwriters to helm a modern version of a tale that isn’t easy to dig into.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Nov 27, 2023

Thouigh it may not tear your soul apart, it certainly has some grisly sights to show you.

Full Review | Oct 26, 2023

It’s dripping in suspense and terror, and finally brings some mystique to the Cenobites once again.

Full Review | Oct 10, 2023

The game of alliances, sacrifices, betrayals, and blood tributes places this new Hellraiser within the slasher status of some of its predecessors... [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Jul 6, 2023

Overall, the Hellraiser franchise is a transfixing art installation, one that is enjoyable for its abstract frights and chills...

Full Review | Jun 5, 2023

Hellraiser aims to reconcile the saga's series of sequels falling flat by revisiting the hallmarks of what made the original such a success.

Full Review | Original Score: 7/10 | Feb 23, 2023

On the surface, Bruckner’s new vision of the story bears only symbolic resemblance to Barker’s original novella The Hellbound Heart, but upon closer examination there are several thematic connections lurking just beneath the skin.

Full Review | Original Score: A+ | Feb 18, 2023

What works most about the new Hellraiser are its leads. Odessa A’zion’s performance makes up for a lot of what the script lacks.

Full Review | Feb 9, 2023

From the gore effects to the plot to the general scares, this movie is inferior to the 35 year old original in every way. And this Priest deserves better.

Full Review | Dec 24, 2022

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, Piotrowski, and Collins in their previous feature, <i>The Night House</i>.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5 | Dec 15, 2022

As a society we must stop kink-shaming the Hell Priest, Pinhead, but as a critic I have some complaints with their latest movie.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5 | Nov 24, 2022

A mediocre entry in the horror saga that comes alive only when the menstruous entities take center stage. [Full Review in Spanish]

Full Review | Nov 9, 2022

The elaborate new Cenobite designs owe as much to Guillermo del Toro’s bioclockwork as Barker’s S&M body mods, but yet again the emissaries of Hell stand around being philosophically evil rather than doing much of anything.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Nov 8, 2022

The new Hellraiser is grisly meat-and-potatoes, but it still has a flavor that lets you know Bruckner is behind the camera.

Full Review | Nov 8, 2022

Not quite a revelation, but David Bruckner's Hellraiser breathes enough new life into this long-thought-dead franchise thanks to a thrilling third act and an imposing performance from Jamie Clayton.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Nov 3, 2022

A gory, grotesque sideshow of torture and torment with a rogues' gallery of monstrous creations made for lifelong fans of the franchise and a perfect entry point into the Hellraiser world for anyone just hearing the name Pinhead for the first time.

Full Review | Original Score: 7.5/10 | Nov 2, 2022

There is great joy to be found in actual effort being put into the Hellraiser series again, and let’s view this as a promising first step toward a new kind of unspeakable.

Full Review | Oct 28, 2022

It’s the nightmarish imagery more than the narrative that has made Hellraiser one of the most iconic and enduring horror films of all time.

Full Review | Oct 27, 2022

While it's missing the queerness and sexuality of Barker's source material, this new interpretation teases a fascinating mythology in its ties to Hellbound: Hellraiser 2. Clayton's Priest is a standout who needs/deserves more screen time.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Oct 20, 2022

Hulu’s Hellraiser is a shock to the system that gets a little lost in its grotesque excess

David bruckner’s new hellraiser is a high-fashion nightmare that gets surprisingly preachy and almost too gruesome at times.

By Charles Pulliam-Moore , a reporter focusing on film, TV, and pop culture. Before The Verge, he wrote about comic books, labor, race, and more at io9 and Gizmodo for almost five years.

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A close-up shot of a bald woman who is cast in shadow but backlit by a red glow that highlights the dozens of thin two-inch-long needles protruding from every part of her face and a pair of circular objects dangling from her throat.

Hulu’s new Hellraiser from director David Bruckner knows that the concepts of leather, latex, and pain as a source of sexual pleasure have become much more mainstream in the decades since Clive Barker’s original 1987 film first introduced the world to Pinhead. You can see that awareness reflected all over the film in its multitude of narrative updates that make this new Hellraiser feel tailor-made for our recent era of sex positivity and anxieties over how people relate to sex .

There’s quite a bit to admire about Hellraiser , particularly for those interested in testing their own limitations with consuming disturbing works of art. But in its efforts to be as beautiful as it is macabre, Hellraiser sometimes becomes almost too potent of a grotesquerie, which to be fair, may be either a feature or a bug depending on what kinda stuff you’re into.

Though it shares a handful of notable plot points with Barker’s novel The Hellbound Heart , Bruckner’s Hellraiser tells the mostly new story of a young woman named Riley (Odessa A’zion) who inadvertently unleashes chaos and pain into the lives of the people she loves most after she solves a mysterious puzzle box. The twisted sights and sadistic delights heralded by this new Lament Configuration are things that Riley, her brother Matt (Brandon Flynn), and their friends can’t begin to fathom as Hellraiser opens. But the movie presumes that it’s all familiar enough territory to its audience to warrant the briefest of glimpses at the next generation of Cenobites in an early scene that takes away some of their mystique before the main story really begins.

A photo of Odessa A’zion as Riley in Hellraiser.

While Hellraiser does eventually become a horrific psychological thriller about the new exquisitely femme Pinhead (Jamie Clayton) and her fellow Cenobites terrorizing a group of unsuspecting 20-somethings, it starts on a surprisingly chaste and almost prudish note. It bothers Matt that Riley met her new boyfriend Trevor (Drew Starkey) at a 12-step-program. It also bothers Matt that his sister, who lives with him, and her boyfriend have zero qualms about having passionate (and very audible) sex in his apartment while he and his boyfriend Colin (Adam Faison) are trying to entertain guests.

In both the original Hellraiser and The Hellbound Heart , people’s sexualities and deep-seated desires were big parts of the animating energy driving things forward. Here, though, there’s a pronounced lack of eroticism outside of an inert sex scene between Riley and Trevor establishing how unreceptive she is to his midthrust proclamations of love. Rather than simmering sexual tensions that bubble over into otherworldly madness, Riley and Matt’s fraught relationship is the new Hellraiser ’s emotional core, which would be fine were it not for the way the movie often feels like it’s trying and mostly failing to ape HBO’s Euphoria when it’s focused on them.

Hellraiser is just not all that interesting as it’s — somewhat moralistically — establishing its heroine as an impulsive woman who can’t quite get past her demons. But that all changes drastically after Riley and Trevor break into a storage container one evening in search of valuables to fence, only to find a small golden box that emits an unsettling, alluring aura.

A photo of the Lament Configuration in Hellraiser.

It’s once the box has gone through its initial transformation and summoned the first of many new Cenobites that Hellraiser really starts coming alive and demonstrating how the 11th installment in a horror franchise can manage to make you sit up, in moments. If you’ve seen a Hellraiser film, then you know how the Cenobites like to get down, and each of the new movie’s gruesome murder scenes will strike you as a return to the franchise’s roots.

In each of the new Cenobites — The Chatterer (Jason Liles), The Weeper (Yinka Olorunnife), The Gasp (Selina Lo), The Asphyx (Zachary Hing), The Mother (Gorica Regodic), and The Masque (Vukašin Jovanovic) — there’s a consistent air of haute couture to their physical forms. What’s lacking in Hellraiser ’s script is more than made up for by the information about the Cenobites that you can infer from the astounding detail that concept designer Keith Thompson and prosthetics artists Josh and Sierra Russell put into each character’s uniquely mutilated body.

Clayton’s Pinhead, the Hell Priest, is truly a sight to behold and a brilliantly elegant reimagining of the classic demon, with an ensemble fashioned more out of the absence of flesh rather than just scarification and skin-tight material. Hellraiser ’s smartly judicious in the way it deploys Pinhead, dropping her into just enough key moments to let Clayton’s unsettlingly serene performance sing without letting you get too comfortable watching her tear people apart.

A photo of Jamie Clayton as Pinhead in the new Hellraiser.

But as mesmerizing as Clayton’s Pinhead and the other Cenobites are, it’s in spite of how middling and strangely sententious the movie feels as it draws to a close. Again, different strokes will always appeal to different folks, and Hellraiser ’s firing on enough cylinders to be exactly the sort of gore-fest that people are wont to watch as we roll into spooky season. But for those in search of more cerebral scares (or folks who just aren’t into torture porn as entertainment) Hellraiser should probably be approached with a little caution.

Hellraiser also stars Hiam Abbass, Goran Višnjić, and Kit Clarke. The film hits Hulu on October 7th.

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‘Hellraiser’ Review: Hurt Me, Please

A mystical puzzle box unleashes indescribable agony and knockout special effects in this reimagined horror movie.

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By Jeannette Catsoulis

With its potent blend of sadomasochism, blasphemy and body horror, Clive Barker’s “Hellraiser” (1987) was a genuinely disturbing dip into deviance that multiple sequels failed to replicate. Taking another shot, the suits behind this reimagined “Hellraiser” smartly handed directing duties to David Bruckner, whose résumé might be brief, but whose gift for injecting dread — even into otherwise inert projects — is apparent.

Here, Bruckner reveals a new talent: holding his own against practical effects (by a team led by Josh and Sierra Russell) so spectacular that the movie’s lack of a theatrical release is almost criminal. A visual and ideological upgrade on the original, “Hellraiser” centers on Riley (Odessa A’zion), a frazzled addict in her 20s who gains possession of a mysterious puzzle box belonging to Voight (Goran Visnjic), a degenerate millionaire. Configured correctly, the box opens a portal to another dimension, releasing ghoulish creatures called Cenobites who delight in taking the human desire for extreme sensation to its logical conclusion.

More intricate and more numerous than their forbears, the Cenobites threaten to steal the show. In particular, Jamie Clayton’s performance as their leader (a role memorably originated by Doug Bradley) has a menacing eroticism that underscores the movie’s thematic focus. Less notable are Riley’s sidekicks, a ho-hum bunch that quickly squanders our patience. And a slack, overlong middle section inside Voight’s mansion — itself an intricately designed puzzle — cries out for a more ruthless editor.

As an ambitious allegory for the chaos and torment of addiction, “Hellraiser” works mainly because of A’zion, who gives her scattered character a deeply human desperation. For Riley, demons from hell are hardly scarier than the ones she fights every day.

Hellraiser Rated R for sex, substances and sickening stuff with needles. Running time: 2 hours 1 minute. Watch on Hulu.

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'Hellraiser' Review: New Blood but Few Thrills in Reanimated Horror Classic

Hulu's glossy 2022 reboot is the best entry in this series for years, but that isn't saying much.

Jamie Clayton pins her hopes on a Hellraiser reboot.

The new Hellraiser is all about dead-eyed creatures bringing back something that should have stayed dead. But that's enough about streaming services rebooting aging movie and TV franchises, let's talk about the latest Generation Z take on a horror classic.

Streaming on Hulu now, the 2022 version of Hellraiser is a slick (and blood-slicked) tale of a young woman forced to face sadomasochistic demons to save her brother. It revives a series that began with a deliciously demented 1987 British flick directed by horror author Clive Barker from his own novella, which was a torrid morality play turbocharged by lurid gore, instantly iconic design and lashings of sensual S&M. The teasingly open-ended story opened a portal for nine sequels that fleshed out the lore of heaven and hell, although you don't need to worry about that now -- partly because at least one of them was a cheapo rights grab, but more importantly because the reboot makes sense on its own.

The new film centers on Riley, a broke recovering addict played by Odessa A'zion with sweaty desperation even before she encounters the supernatural. Think Broad City with more flayings. She's crashing with her exasperated brother and some random roommates as she mutters some non-specific stuff about getting a better job and blah blah blah -- the film really doesn't care about any of this, which makes it tough for the viewer to get engaged in Riley or her cardboard cutout chums. Things start to get weird when Riley's not-quite boyfriend proves to be a bad influence and they discover the franchise's signature MacGuffin, a fiendish Rubik's cube that summons the grisly Coenobites (deadpan monsters in unnerving prosthetics and fetish gear).

Jamie Clayton takes over from original star Doug Bradley as the high priest of these soul-chomping sybarites, nicknamed Pinhead for fairly obvious reasons. It's a worthy new take on a horror icon, and the film does throw up some flashes of imagination in the design, the gory set pieces and the direction from David Bruckner, who helmed chilling The Night House.

But there's more than a whiff of the '90s as four good-looking but utterly personality-free twentysomethings wind up in a creepy mansion. Where the original introduced flawed humans with relatably sordid urges, the reboot offers no-one with hopes, flaws, dreams or even backstory. Who is Riley's brother apart from being her judgey landlord? What was their relationship like as kids? Where are their parents? Is there any unresolved conflict between them? One so-called "character" introduces herself with the words "I'm the roommate" and no other information is ever given about her, which blunts the impact when she's imaginatively tortured. Seriously, the film can't offer you any reason to care about this cast other than the fact they're on your screen.

Which is a shame, because monsters who can't distinguish between pleasure and pain is, if anything, more timely than ever. In this distraction-saturated, seen-it-all-before-and-posted-it-on-TikTok age, Hellraiser offers a unique opportunity to explore how far you have to go to feel something. The film vaguely gestures at Riley's millennial numbness, but it's pretty superficial stuff. One of the twisted charms of the original film was how the main character embraced the nastiness, sending the film into off-kilter territory where you had no idea who to root for. By contrast, this sexless reboot is sorely lacking those layers of shock and perversity.

As it happens, right now there are more films than you can shake an ax at which delve into the horror of disaffected life in the social media age. To name a few off the top of my head, stuff like The Seed, Cam, Men, We're All Going to the World's Fair or Bodies Bodies Bodies have something to say beyond shock and gore. Hellraiser, meanwhile, pits broke and disenfranchised youth against a callous millionaire, but doesn't have much to say about it.

Odessa A'zion sulks over some dinner in the Hellraiser reboot.

Odessa A'zion raises some hell.

The current war between streaming services has created an insatiable market for new stuff -- but not too new: reboots and sequels and prequels vie to grab your attention with a familiar title. Remember that thing you like ? There's a new one! The success of the recent Halloween movies show that familiar horror icons still have legs, especially in spooky season (Michael Myers returns again in the optimistically-titled Halloween Ends on Oct. 14) and streamers are throwing up new takes on everything from Scream to a family-friendly Predator and Hocus Pocus 2 . All very well for the casual pumpkin-carving viewer to drop in around Halloween, but serious horror fans might find this genre tourism pretty lightweight. Luckily, the true horror fan can find original, bleeding edge frights in more horror-focused spaces, like streaming service Shudder .

The new 2022 Hellraiser does some cool stuff when it reaches the back stretch, although the two-hour-long film spends way too long spinning its wheels to get there. It won't tear your soul apart, but at least it's a drop of fresh blood for a series that didn't deserve to stay dead.

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Hellraiser Review: The Reboot Is A Step Up For The Franchise, But Is That Enough? [Fantastic Fest]

In 1987, Clive Barker unleashed "Hellraiser," his stylish, artistic, gooey, kinky horror pic adapted from his own novella, "The Hellbound Heart." The film became a big hit and introduced audiences to the cenobites, a group of S&M creatures — angels to some, demons to others — who are summoned from untold dimensions by a puzzle box to offer people unspeakable pleasures and pain. The leader of the group, Pinhead, instantly became iconic, and when that sort of thing happens, sequels follow. Sure enough, a total of 10 films came out of the "Hellraiser" world, each more disappointing than the last. The series became dire, taking unused scripts for thrillers and clumsily shoe-horning Pinhead into the mix. Worse: the sequels also completely betrayed what made Pinhead and his cenobite pals so memorable. In the first and second films, which were shot back-to-back, Pinhead and his gang aren't necessarily evil demons from hell. They're otherworldly beings who get off on extreme pain. And if they dragged a few people to their death in the process, well, that was okay, too.

But as the series progressed (or regressed would probably be the better word), Pinhead changed into a Freddy Krueger-style slasher, spouting one-liners and stalking people like a common serial killer. Over the years, as the franchise grew worse, there was plenty of talk about a potential remake, or reboot, or reimagining, or whatever you want to call it. Now, it's happened (this is actually one of two reboots on the way; there's a TV series headed to HBO Max, too). Pinhead is back, now played by Jamie Clayton, our first female Pinhead. This idea isn't so far removed from the source material — the character that appears in "The Hellbound Heart" is described as androgynous, with a feminine voice. David Bruckner, who helmed the recent, and very scary "The Night House," is at the helm here, and that's a promising idea. Bruckner's "Night House" had a certain "Hellraiser"-vibe to it, complete with its obsession over physical structures and shapes that can be used to summon things from another world. So when I heard Bruckner was the one to bring the new "Hellraiser" to life, I perked up. With the franchise in such dire straits, bringing in someone like Bruckner could only be a step-up, right?

The answer: yes. How could it not? And yet ... Bruckner's "Hellraiser" still feels lacking, although not for lack of trying. Pinhead and the new cenobites here are effectively scary and strange — but good look trying to see them for most of the film. They all have slick new designs, but the film is so murky and dark that you might need to boost your TV brightness. Barker's original film trafficked in darkness, too. But we could still see what the frig was happening on the screen. The real issue with Bruckner's "Hellraiser," however, is that it often feels kind of generic. I don't even love Barker's original film all that much, but it felt different . Barker was never the best filmmaker, but he knew how to create an otherworldly atmosphere that stuck in your brain. I can't say the same for what Bruckner is doing here. On top of that, the inherent kinkiness built into the series is completely gone (sure, there are sex scenes, but they're fairly vanilla). "Hellraiser" 2022 is the best the franchise has been in a while, but that's also not saying much.

Angels to some, demons to others

After a neat little spy-movie-like intro in which two characters swap the infamous puzzle box somewhere in Serbia, "Hellraiser" arrives back in the states to focus on Riley (Odessa A'zion), a recovering drug addict living with her brother Matt (Brandon Flynn), Matt's boyfriend Colin (Adam Faison), and another roommate (Selina Lo). Riley is in the midst of a relationship with Trevor (Drew Starkey), a fellow addict (the two of them met in rehab) that Matt sees as bad news. Also, there's a subplot about a mysterious billionaire (Goran Višnjić) who has an entire complex devoted to the mysterious puzzle box (it's traditionally called Lemarchand's Box, or the Lament Configuration).

Through a series of unlikely events, Riley comes into possession of the box and — you guessed it — raises hell! Pinhead, played effectively with just the right air of detached menace by Clayton, shows up and says that either Riley can come with the cenobites to a world of pain, or someone else can go in her place. But did Riley really see any of this? She relapsed and took drugs right before she fooled around with the box, and there's a sense that maybe this is all a hallucination.

But clearly, something is wrong, because Matt eventually disappears into thin air, and Riley is determined to find him. This setup is fine, although it regurgitates one of the laziest tropes in this series — the idea that it's so damn easy to open that killer puzzle box and summon Pinhead and the 'bites. The franchise already tried to address this by suggesting the box wants to be opened so it can kill people. But in the original movie, finding the box was a whole big deal — something people tracked down obsessively. And while there's a hint of that in the film's prologue, it's all but abandoned until later in the narrative, and that feels like a mistake. I'm also generally tired of the whole "that scary thing you just saw was a hallucination — or was it??? " concept in horror movies, and adding it to "Hellraiser" plays like a miscalculation. That's not to say the film sticks with that for its entire runtime — it eventually becomes clear that this is all real when people start being flayed alive by those ever-present cenobite chains.

Such sights to show you

"Hellraiser" 2022 really finds its grove in its final hour, but getting there is tough going (the film clocks in at slightly over 2 hours, which is a mistake). I wanted to dig this, as I dig Bruckner's work. But every scene felt like it was missing one key ingredient to make it all click. There's gore and torture, but done in a rather safe manner. There's sex, but none of the kinkiness that drives the best entries of the series. And while Odessa A'zion is a strong lead, the supporting actors are rather weak, although that's more a result of underwritten parts.

As for the cenobites, they're aces. The BDSM leather that defined the characters for years is gone. Instead, the cenobites have mutilated their flesh to resemble clothing — I particularly liked how the "robes" Pinhead is wearing here is actually just the character's own skin butchered into the shape of flowing fabric. Clayton makes for a great Pinhead — she's wisely not trying to emulate Doug Bradley's now-iconic performance and instead is making the character her own. This isn't quippy, slasher Pinhead. This is a Pinhead who likes to watch, and wait.

Through it all, Bruckner's direction gives the film the vibe of a '90s horror sequel. Is that intentional? I assume it is, and I appreciated the idea of deliberately invoking that '90s horror style. At the same time, I expected more from Bruckner after the visual flair of "The Night House." And just to make things extra confusing, the final act of the film feels heavily lifted from the 2001 remake of "Thirteen Ghosts," which ... is kind of weird.

"Hellraiser" was in bad shape, and what Bruckner has done here is lift the series out of the gutter to give it a touch of old-school charm. But I know he can do better, and I just wish this revival was more of an icky, gooey success rather than a moderately okay horror pic. Oh well, I'm sure Pinhead and the gang will come back again at some point. They always do.

/Film Review: 6.5 out of 10

Hellraiser (2022) review: A great reboot that might not be weird enough

We love Hellraiser (2022), but we understand the pain of those who will not

Pinhead (Jamie Clayton) in Hellraiser (2022)

The word of a new Hellraiser movie probably elicited equal measures pleasure and discomfort. Such is the way of the Cenobites, the otherworldly species of people who prey upon desire and don't discern a difference between pain and pleasure. But I know I only experienced happiness when watching Hellraiser (2022) .

After 10 whole feature films, Hellraiser — like many a movie series that kept getting sequels — became a little too cumbersome and filled with lore. It needed what I'll refer to as the Halloween '18 treatment. That's because David Gordon Green's 2018 Halloween movie was the perfect way to revive the Michael Myers franchise, cutting out all the canon it had to, resulting in a clean slate for mayhem.

Now, Hellraiser (2022) brings the Cenobites, led by a new Pinhead (Jamie Clayton), and their mysterious and malicious puzzle box (known as Lemarchand's Box), to our present day. Here, new humans will be manipulated, as the Cenobites toy with our desires.

Should you watch the new Hellraiser? Will OG Hellraiser fans be disappointed by this reinvention or find it cause for celebration? Keep reading this Hellraiser (2022) review to find out.

This is a spoiler-free review, so don't beware!

Hellraiser (2022) is on Hulu, which starts at $6.99 per month

Hellraiser (2022) review: What works

The best part of Hellraiser (2022) will be its most hotly-contested characteristic. By throwing out sequels worth of confusion and presenting a much simpler story than the original, this new Hellraiser feels all the more coherent. The puzzle box, with all of its hidden weapons, is still a tempting and deceitful device, and the humans trying to toy with each other to use it, are as devious as ever.

Odessa A'zion is pretty much instantly compelling as Riley, a Final Girl who's already been fighting her battle against substance abuse with pills. The whole premise and situation with the Cenobites and Lemarchand's Box is so weird that the movie benefits from her confusion about it all.

Riley (Odessa A'zion) in Hellraiser (2022)

Similarly, A'zion is working with a good supporting cast, or at least a group that all plays their roles well. Colin (Adam Faison) is the helpful friend, the one who knows when to be humane but also when a situation necessitates a big scream.

Nora (Aoife Hinds) doesn't have a whole lot to do, but Hinds' natural delivery in pretty supernatural moments is commendable. Riley's boyfriend Trevor (Drew Starkey), who she met during rehabilitation, delivers frantic "we gotta leave" lines well enough. too

And while the lead Cenobite — whom we know as Pinhead (Jamie Clayton) — is thankfully not over-exposed in the film, Clayton makes the most of her moments, with her subdued and creepy performance. You almost might think she and her people aren't pure evil. Her character, I should note, is called The Priest in the credits, so the film eschews the Pinhead name used in Hellraiser II and goes for something similar to The Hell Priest name from Barker's The Scarlet Gospels book.

Hellraiser (2022) review: What doesn't work

Watch Hellraiser (2022) directly after watching the original, as I did, and you will clearly see that the team behind it had a goal: take a great, wild and sadistic idea, and put it in a movie format that's less campy than the original. Depending on your point of view, this is likely either a great thing or a bad move.

I'm somewhere in between those polar reactions. My gut says that Hellraiser (2022) accomplishes what it needed to do, but at the loss of some of the its uniqueness. I don't have a strong affinity for the original, but I could see how its fans might think this new model is diluted.

Mr. Voight (Goran Visnjic) holds Lemarchand's Box in Hellraiser (2022)

This reboot has nothing like Clare Higgins' intense performance as Julia Cotton, who was driven by lust for her estranged husband's brother Frank (who just so happens to be a demonic fraction of his old self). Those moments where Frank's body was re-assembled? Gone from this version, along the weird lust of that original movie.

Outlook: Should you watch Hellraiser (2022)?

Lemarchand's Box is spotlit on a surface in Hellraiser (2022)

Fans of the original Hellraiser will probably have an itching need to see how their classic has been updated. If they want something utterly peculiar and not just diabolical, I'm not sure their desires will be sated. And I hope nobody hands them a puzzle box with the promise of "the Hellraiser reboot of their desires."

Those who aren't tightly bound to the ways of the original — or jump straight to this reboot — will likely have an easier time with with Hellraiser. As I've noted in this Hellraiser (2022) review, it's a fun and violent horror movie that will keep you entertained.

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Henry is a managing editor at Tom’s Guide covering streaming media, laptops and all things Apple, reviewing devices and services for the past seven years. Prior to joining Tom's Guide, he reviewed software and hardware for TechRadar Pro, and interviewed artists for Patek Philippe International Magazine. He's also covered the wild world of professional wrestling for Cageside Seats, interviewing athletes and other industry veterans.

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Hellraiser (2022) is the best horror reboot since Halloween (2018)

The new movie delivers plenty of shocking body horror, with a heavy dose of franchise-building lore.

Before the fidget spinner, there was the Lament Configuration. Or, as all but the most diehard horror fans probably know it, the Hellraiser cube.

First introduced to cinemagoers in the 1987 movie, the story behind this interdimensional puzzle started out pretty simple. Some poor soon-to-be victim mindlessly plays with what looks like a bespoke Rubix Cube until it whirs and clicks into a new position and promptly summons monsters from a dimension much more horrifying than ours to do what they do best.

The interdimensional laws that guide the cube have never really been as important as the demons behind it, a group known as Cenobites who take pleasure in inflicting (and experiencing) pain led by a being known as Pinhead. But in the 2022 reboot , streaming this Friday on Hulu, the rules of the Lament Configuration are suddenly very important.

This is the new Hellraiser ’s biggest strength — and also its worst weakness. By focusing attention on the rules that bind its universe, the film delivers the sort of lore-heavy details that most fans can’t get enough of right now. But in the process, it also loses some of the chaotic joy that made the original movie so great, though there’s still plenty of gross body horror for anyone who’s just in it for the skin flaying and the leather.

Directed by David Bruckner with input from franchise creator Clive Barker, Hellraiser stars Odessa A'zion as Riley, a recovering addict living with her brother and dating a guy who seems sketchy. When her boyfriend convinces her to join him on a heist, they wind up stealing the cube. Riley fidgets with it until it suddenly whirs into a new position and out pops a shiny blade.

Without getting into spoilers, I’ll just say that someone gets stabbed, and before too long, Pinhead (Jamie Clayton) arrives to inflict her trademark blend of pain and pleasure. From there, the plot moves quickly as the Lament Configuration cycles through a series of shapes, claiming a new victim with each transformation. The endgame here is that if the cube reaches its final form, whoever holds it gets to wish for something from the Cenobites — you can probably guess whether this is an Aladdin genie wish situation or more of a Monkey’s Paw.

Odessa A'zion as protagonist Riley.

In a cast of unknowns (the biggest name here is probably Succession series regular Hiam Abbass), A'zion is a competent lead, and her character’s addiction help blur the lines between reality and insanity early on. But the real star of the show is Pinhead, a clever reinterpretation of the original played by Doug Bradley that’s different enough to stand on its own but similar enough to recall the original. The rest of the Cenobites are also incredibly freakish. I spent much of the movie trying to figure out what you would have to do to the human body to make it look like that .

The way the Cenobites torture and murder their victims is also ghoulishly horrific. Bruckner and his team seem to enjoy tearing Pinhead’s victims to pieces just as much as Pinhead does. This is not a movie for the squeamish or anyone who hates body horror, but you hopefully already knew that. Still, it’s comforting that the now-Disney-owned franchise hasn’t been sanitized. Pinhead won’t be joining the Marvel Cinematic Universe anytime soon.

A terrifying new Cenobite design.

The beauty of the original Hellraiser was its simplicity. It was a story of one man who became a monster by his own fault and the damage he did after that. The Cenobites played a minor role, appearing just enough to entice the audience without overstaying their welcome. But in the years since, we saw a lot more of Pinhead and his (now her) friends.

In those same years, audiences have also become obsessed with canon and lore — the Hellraiser wiki can be shockingly detailed. It’s in that world that Hellraiser 2022 exists, for better or for worse.

Hellraiser streams October 7 on Hulu.

Review: The shocking turns to numbness in new ‘Hellraiser’

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‘Hellraiser’

Writer-director Clive Barker’s 1987 horror movie “Hellraiser” (adapting his novella “The Hellbound Heart”) became a cult favorite due to its kinky overtones and its visually striking villain: a spiky-domed demon dubbed Pinhead. The new reboot retains the elements that define a “Hellraiser” story, including the sadomasochistic extra-dimensional monsters and a cast of human “heroes” who rarely act heroically. But there’s something lacking. For all the flayed flesh and impaled skin in the picture, this “Hellraiser” isn’t sharp enough.

Directed by David Bruckner from a screenplay by Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski — a trio who previously collaborated on the excellent supernatural thriller “The Night House” — this “Hellraiser” stars Odessa A’zion as Riley, a habitual substance user who helps her shady boyfriend steal an ancient puzzle-box. The box can be twisted into multiple configurations, each of which leads to the solver’s hands getting punctured and a portal opening to a realm ruled by the Cenobites, a hedonistic race for whom pleasure, pain and enlightenment are all tightly — some might say constrictively — intertwined.

The new “Hellraiser” is suitably bloody, and Bruckner and company understand (at least theoretically) the core of Barker’s premise, in which people’s rapacious needs end up hurting everyone in their general vicinity. The movie even has a great Pinhead, played by Jamie Clayton, who captures the Hell Priest’s eerie calm and unsettlingly alien carriage. But while this film looks better and feels more serious than most of the “Hellraiser” sequels, there’s something pro forma about it. The plot grinds through nightmarish scenes of demonic menace and torture, with no sense of surprise or revelation. Conceptually, the picture works. But over the course of two hours, what was shocking becomes numbing.

‘Hellraiser.’ R, for strong bloody horror violence and gore, language throughout, some sexual content and brief graphic nudity. 2 hours, 1 minute. Available on Hulu

‘To Leslie’

At the start of the jittery indie drama “To Leslie,” a free-spirited Texan named Leslie ( Andrea Riseborough ) wins the kind of lottery prize usually referred to as “life-changing money.” But Leslie doesn’t really want her life changed. A reckless alcoholic, she burns through her windfall so fast that she loses everything — including her son James (Owen Teague), who has set himself up with a calmer life with the help of old family friends Dutch (Stephen Root) and Nancy (Allison Janney). Years later, Leslie visits James, Dutch and Nancy, looking for their help; but she still has no interest in getting clean or following anyone’s rules.

“To Leslie” is one of those addiction and redemption stories that spends as much time on the heroine hitting rock bottom as it does on her comeback — which happens when a good-hearted motel manager named Sweeney (Marc Maron) offers her a job and a room. Director Michael Morris, working from a Ryan Binaco screenplay, explores the spaces and the sounds of a never-ending bender: the tear-in-the-beer country songs, the wild swings from giddy to vicious and so on. It’s a story often told, but this movie tells it well, energetically dramatizing the in-the-moment experiences Leslie has and showing how they inform the choices she makes. And Riseborough is a dynamo, making sure that even at her worst, Leslie has enough personality and humanity that the audience roots for her just to get through another day.

‘To Leslie.’ R, for language throughout and some drug use. 1 hour, 59 minutes. Available on VOD; playing theatrically, Laemmle Monica, Santa Monica; Harkins Chino Hills

‘Luckiest Girl Alive’

Based on Jessica Knoll’s best-selling mystery novel, the Mike Barker-directed “Luckiest Girl Alive” — with a script by Knoll — falls into the trap of trying too hard to capture not just the book’s flashback-heavy plot but also its distinctive voice. Mila Kunis stars as Ani Fanelli, a successful magazine columnist about to marry Luke (Finn Wittrock), the millionaire man of her dreams — a rite of passage that would be more fulfilling if Ani weren’t still haunted by her experiences as a teen at a prestigious private school, where she endured both a sexual assault and a mass shooting. Kunis also narrates the film, sharing the heroine’s often acerbic thoughts about New York society types and how hard she’s fought to overcome her trauma.

Kunis is a powerhouse actress; and Barker and Knoll do a fine job of capturing the ambiguities of Ani’s situation. She was friendly with the gunmen who shot up her school, who offered comfort when her rapists were bullying and mocking her; and as a result her lingering regrets and resentments from those years have made her wins as an adult more bittersweet. But all of this is over-explained in the film — often by Ani herself, in the incessant voice-overs. Add in the time-jumping narrative structure and “Luckiest Girl Alive” begins to feel too much like a puzzle, which when solved is supposed to present a complete picture of who Ani is — albeit a two-dimensional one.

‘Luckiest Girl Alive.’ R, for violent content, rape, sexual material, language throughout and teen substance use. 1 hour, 55 minutes. Available on Netflix

‘The Redeem Team’

When the 1992 “Dream Team” of NBA all-stars arrived at the Olympics in Barcelona, its goals were twofold: to reassert America’s dominance in its homegrown sport and to elevate basketball into a global product. They succeeded at both, though in the process of boosting basketball’s popularity, they inspired a generation of international players who proved capable of beating the Americans a decade later. Jon Weinbach’s insightful and emotional documentary “The Redeem Team” looks at how USA basketball regained its mojo at the 2008 Beijing games. Using new interviews and rare footage from practices, Weinbach breaks down how Coach Mike Krzyzewski and stars Kobe Bryant and LeBron James helped change the team’s culture by emphasizing unity, patriotism and the larger Olympic experience. Aside from some liberal use of profanity, this is not a warts-and-all portrait of these complicated men. It’s more a feel-good recap of an impressive championship run. But the game analysis is keen, and the arc of this story is undeniably inspiring, arguing that victory is sweeter when it springs from a common purpose.

‘The Redeem Team.’ TV-MA, for language. 1 hour, 37 minutes. Available on Netflix

‘Mr. Harrigan’s Phone’

Horror author Stephen King is responsible for some of the scariest short stories and most spine-tingling novels ever written; but a lot of his most original work has been in his novellas, which offer richly detailed character studies, only lightly tinged with thrills and chills. “Mr. Harrigan’s Phone” is a fine example, both in print and in the new movie adaptation, written and directed by John Lee Hancock. It’s not scary; it is instead an alternately touching and haunting story about the relationship between a sensitive teen named Craig (Jaeden Martell) and the grumpy old rich man (Donald Sutherland) he reads to once a week. When Mr. Harrigan dies, Craig starts texting the dead man’s cell, and sees some of his darkest wishes begin to come true. The plot is the stuff of “The Twilight Zone” — and, frankly, not quite twisty enough to sustain a 105-minute film — but Hancock and his cast effectively convey the essence of King’s story, which is about a well-meaning kid learning how anything that comes too easy likely has dark strings attached.

‘Mr. Harrigan’s Phone.’ PG-13, for thematic material, some strong language, violent content and brief drug material. 1 hour, 45 minutes. Available on Netflix

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“Invisible Demons” is a harrowing documentary depiction of people on the frontlines of a global environmental catastrophe. Director Rahul Jain brings his cameras to Delhi, where he gathers testimonials about what it’s like to live in a crowded city choked with factory pollution and consumerist refuse. Jain then intersperses those personal stories with immersive sequences that plunge viewers into the experience of navigating floods, heat, smog and sewage. Available on Mubi

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Hellraiser: release date, reviews, trailer, cast and everything we know about the horror remake

The Hellraiser horror franchise is getting a remake.

Hellraiser returns to our screens with a reboot-slash-sequel to the popular horror entry.

Clive Barker's Hellraiser saga is one of the longest-running franchises in horror. Initially adapted and directed by the author himself from his own novella, "The Hellbound Heart," in 1987, Hellraiser quickly became one of the genre's staples. As slashers and serial killers dominated horror, the story of the Cenobites and their merciless exploration of the boundaries of pleasure and pain stood out among the crowd. Pinhead, the central antagonist, became one of the most instantly iconic villains in horror movies and for good reason.

Studios have spent a long time trying to remake or reboot the Hellraiser saga, but all failed. However, this fall, just in time for Halloween, Hulu is reviving the Cenobites with director David Bruckner in the form of the R-rated Hellraiser (the same title as the very first film in the series.) Horror experts and newbies alike should prepare for an all-new descent into hell.

Here is everything we know about the brand-new Hellraiser so far.

When is the Hellraiser release date?

Hellraiser releases exclusively on Hulu on October 7. No word has yet been given on its international distribution, although it seems likely it will turn up on Disney Plus outside of America, much like other Hulu properties.

What is the plot of Hellraiser?

According to the synopsis on IMDb , the Hellraiser remake is a "reimagining" of Barker's franchise, focusing on "a young woman [who] must confront the sadistic, supernatural forces behind an enigmatic puzzle-box responsible for her brother's disappearance." That description suggests this won’t be a straight-up remake of the first film or novella, both of which focus on a sadistic man and his lover who kill people to resurrect him while his niece tries to stop both them and the Cenobites.

The Cenobites are the central antagonists of the saga, a series of interdimensional beings who work as guards for The Order of the Gash. They were once human but were transformed into their grotesque, bondage-inspired fetish appearances after opening the puzzle-box they now look after. Cenobites are so removed from their former humanity that they can no longer distinguish between sensations of pleasure and pain. When summoned by humans who open the box, the Cenobites take them, willingly or otherwise, to their home dimension and torture them for eternity.

The first three Hellraiser movies follow a reasonably well-constructed narrative arc, with a heavy focus on both the human Kirsty, whose devious uncle and stepmother helped to usher in the Cenobites, and the lead Cenobite Pinhead. After that, the franchise quickly devolved into more traditional slasher fare that started hastily adapting unrelated scripts into Hellraiser -related stories, all of which greatly weakened the series and moved it further away from its origins. The new Hellraiser seems eager to return to the simplicity of the original tale.

What is Hellraiser rated?

Hellraiser is rated R for "strong bloody horror violence and gore, language throughout, some sexual content and brief graphic nudity."

Hellraiser reviews — what the critics are saying

What to Watch's Hellraiser review summed up the reboot by saying while the plotting if a bit of a mess, Jamie Clayton's performance as Pinhead and the overall message of the movie make for a pleasurable enough watch.

As for the critical consensus, Hellraiser is "Certified Fresh" on Rotten Tomatoes , earning a score of 80% as of October 6.

Hellraiser trailer

After a teaser for the new Hellraiser , an official trailer has been released that gives fans the best look at the reboot to the horror franchise. After giving some background to the puzzle box that unleashes the Cenobites, the trailer treats fans to a first look at the demons from another dimension, including Jamie Clayton's Pinhead. Watch the trailer directly below (as well as the previous teaser):

Who is in the Hellraiser cast?

The uniting force across almost every Hellraiser movie was Doug Bradley, who played Pinhead. This time around, the character is being played by Jamie Clayton, who you may recognize from Netflix’s Sense8 and Showtime's The L Word: Generation Q .

Clayton is one of the most prominent trans actresses working today and her casting is pretty much perfect for the lead Cenobite. In the novella, the Cenobite (who isn’t actually named Pinhead until the second film) is described as having "the voice of an excited girl," and being, like the other Cenobites, "sexless." The opportunity to reassert Pinhead as a queer character is exciting (Barker’s work is famously very queer-inclusive in a way that mainstream horror wasn’t at the time.)

Starring alongside Clayton is Odessa A'zion as Riley, the heroine looking for her brother. She was most recently seen in the Netflix series Grand Army . Rounding out the cast are Brandon Flynn ( 13 Reasons Why ), Goran Višnjić ( Timeless , ER ), Drew Starkey ( Love, Simon ), and Hiam Abbass ( Succession ).

Who is the Hellraiser director?

Director David Bruckner is handling this remake of Hellraiser . A horror filmmaker through and through, Bruckner made his solo directorial feature debut in 2017 with The Ritual , an adaptation of Adam Nevill's novel that followed five friends whose hiking trip in Northern Sweden soon goes horribly awry. Prior to that, he co-directed 2007's The Signal with Dan Bush and Jacob Gentry, about a world where people turn murderous via a mysterious signal sent through their electrical devices. He also contributed to the anthology series V/H/S. His critical peak came in 2020 with The Night House , a psychological horror that was nominated for two Critics' Choice Super Awards.

Jamie Clayton as Pinhead in Hellraiser (2022)

Hellraiser movies

The Hellraiser franchise rivals Friday the 13th , Nightmare on Elm Street and Halloween in terms of longevity. Indeed, it was the success of the most recent Halloween reboot, directed by David Gordon Green, that has been cited as a reason Hulu greenlit and eleventh Hellraiser film.

Four of the previous movies earned theatrical releases, with the next six going straight-to-video. There are also comic book adaptations and tie-in novels. A TV series adaptation from HBO and David Gordon Green is in the works, with Clive Barker on board as an executive producer.

Here is the slate of Hellraiser movies are where to watch them:

Hellraiser (1987) — watch on Prime Video and Tubi in the US; Shudder in the UK
Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1988) — watch on Prime Video, Tubi and The Roku Channel in the US; Shudder in the UK
Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth (1992) — watch via Cinemax channel on Prime Video in US; Virgin TV Go in the UK
Hellraiser: Bloodline (1996) — watch via Cinemax channel on Prime Video in US; not presently available in the UK
Hellraiser: Inferno (2000) — watch via Cinemax channel on Prime Video in US; available through digital on-demand in UK
Hellraiser: Hellseeker (2002) — watch via Cinemax channel on Prime Video in US; available through digital on-demand in UK
Hellraiser: Deader (2005) — watch via Cinemax channel on Prime Video in US; available through digital on-demand in UK
Hellraiser: Hellworld (2005) — watch via Cinemax channel on Prime Video in US; available through digital on-demand in UK
Hellraiser: Revelations (2011) — watch on Tubi, Vudu, Pluto TV in the US; Virgin TV Go in the UK
Hellraiser: Judgment (2018) — watch on Tubi, Vudu, Pluto TV in the US; Virgin TV Go in the UK

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Kayleigh is a pop culture writer and critic based in Dundee, Scotland. Her work can be found on Pajiba, IGN, Uproxx, RogerEbert.com, SlashFilm, and WhatToWatch, among other places. She's also the creator of the newsletter The Gossip Reading Club.

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Cast & crew
User reviews

A young woman struggling with addiction comes into possession of an ancient puzzle box, unaware that its purpose is to summon the Cenobites. A young woman struggling with addiction comes into possession of an ancient puzzle box, unaware that its purpose is to summon the Cenobites. A young woman struggling with addiction comes into possession of an ancient puzzle box, unaware that its purpose is to summon the Cenobites.

David Bruckner
Ben Collins
Luke Piotrowski
David S. Goyer
Odessa A'zion
Jamie Clayton
Adam Faison
651 User reviews
159 Critic reviews
55 Metascore
1 win & 9 nominations

Top cast 21

(as Odessa A’zion)

The Chatterer

(as Greg Decuir)
All cast & crew
Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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Did you know

Trivia Filmed in Belgrade, Serbia.
Goofs When Riley is researching Voight, the results show a list of websites. None of them are valid domain names. This is nothing new for many lower budget films, many of which come up with off-brand search domains as referencing the real ones would be too costly.

The Priest : What is it you pray for? What is it you pray for?

Nora : Salvation.

The Priest : And what it'd feel like? A joyful note? Without change, without end? Heaven? There's no music in that.

[the Priest removes a pin from its head...]

Nora : Please...

[... and penetrates Nora's throat with it]

The Priest : But this... there is so much more the body can be made to feel. And you'll feel it all before we're through.

Connections Featured in Chris Stuckmann Movie Reviews: Hellraiser (2022) (2022)
Soundtracks Hellraiser Theme Written by Christopher Young

User reviews 651

Oct 9, 2022
How long is Hellraiser? Powered by Alexa
October 7, 2022 (United States)
United States
Clive Barker Presents Hellraiser
Belgrade, Serbia
20th Century Studios
Phantom Four Films
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Runtime 2 hours 1 minute
Dolby Digital

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Odessa A’zion

Jamie Clayton

Adam faison, drew starkey, brandon flynn, aoife hinds, jason liles, the chatterer, yinka olorunnife, zachary hing, goran visnjic, hiam abbass, predrag bjelac, gorica regodic, vukasin jovanovic, ivona kustudic, greg de cuir, miodrag milovanov, elderly man, nikola kent, critic reviews.

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Hellraiser Review: Reboot Is a Real Pain to Watch

The new Hellraiser reboot has some fun ideas, but the characters are so dumb that they're not the only ones forced to suffer.

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Jamie Clayton as Pinhead in Hellraiser REview

The original Hellraiser explored the outer limits of pleasure and pain in fascinating, grotesque ways. Hulu’s 2022 reimagining of the Clive Barker classic, however, is simply painful. It takes the most surface-level aspects of the original story and gnarls them into a bloated, forgettable modern horror slog that fumbles the series’ mythology.

In broad strokes, the movie follows a bunch of supremely annoying twentysomethings as they run from an otherworldly evil, screaming at each other incessantly in an ear-splitting attempt to suss out what’s happening to them at any given moment. They act like complete idiots, and it’s incredibly hard to root for or relate to any of them when they’re perpetually in the throes of a screechy temper tantrum or complete emotional breakdown.

The connection to the original film is the lore, which revolves around the Cenobites, a group of horrifically mutilated beings whose entire existence is dedicated to pushing the boundaries of sensation, which often involves insanely painful torture devices and rituals. To them, pain is pleasure, so when a group of young people summons them via an elaborate puzzle box, they arrive to dole out some sweet, sweet suffering as a gift from the beyond.

Leading the group of Gen Z-ers is Riley (Odessa A’zion), a struggling addict whose only lifeline is her protective brother Matt (Brandon Flynn). When the siblings have a falling out, Riley runs to her sketchy boyfriend Trevor (Drew Starkey), who enlists her help in stealing the aforementioned cosmic puzzle box. When the Cenobites are summoned, it marks the start of a deadly ritual in which the lives of many are sacrificed for the supreme ascension of a single soul into BDSM nirvana.

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The fatal flaw of the film is that the characters are almost exclusively douchey and dumb, treating each other like trash to the point where they can’t even say “I love you” without being overly aggressive. Every dialogue exchange sounds like a shared panic attack. It seems that the intent here was to instill a sense of hysteria and paranoia in the audience via the characters’ frenetic behavior, but it ultimately just ends up being annoying.

The movie’s human villain is a cursed (in more ways than one) billionaire named Voight (Goran Visnjic), and he’s one of the picture’s few bright spots. When it’s fully revealed, his plight is actually pretty interesting and reflective of the extremes of modern excess. Visnjic is similarly captivating when he’s onscreen, and it’s a shame he wasn’t included more. His mansion is another highlight, an enormous set with switches, hidden doors, and a badass-looking skylight, which serves as one of the film’s only lasting images.

Hellraiser as a franchise would be nothing without its iconic Cenobite character designs, however, and this winds up being the 2022 iteration’s greatest strength. The artists, designers, and costumers deserve a lot of credit for their updated aesthetics. Pinhead/The Priest (Jamie Clayton) is also a worthy successor to the original Pinhead performance, which was so memorably created by Doug Bradley. Clayton isn’t nearly as frightening, but there’s a magnetism to her that fits the Cenobite credo. Another standout is the Chatterer, (Jason Liles), whose exposed chompers are the stuff of nightmares.

As impressive as this menagerie of freaks looks, it’s sad that they’re shot in such an uninteresting way, with full-frame views aplenty rendering them less scary and more silly at times. Director David Bruckner ( The Night House ) seems to be interested in the mythos and philosophical quandaries of the original more so than its cinematic virtues, which proves to be a detriment here. What’s missing is the mystique, suspense, deliberate pace, and narrative tightness that Barker nailed so well with a fraction of the budget.

There’s no reason that a remade Hellraiser needs to follow the original beat for beat. This 2022 iteration is a completely different story than what we saw in the original 1987 film, and that’s absolutely fine. But it would have been a much better movie had it taken the essential elements of the original and told the new story in the same spirit instead of focusing on a soulless, convoluted maze of a plot that, beyond all of the chains and flayed body parts, doesn’t feel like Hellraiser at all.

1.5 out of 5

Bernard Boo | @BJ_Boo

Bernard Boo is a writer and geek enthusiast living in the San Francisco Bay Area. Movies, TV, video games, and comics are constantly rattling around in his brain,…

AV Undercover

David Bruckner delivers a Hellraiser film fans will have no reason to lament

After decades of lackluster hellraiser sequels, bruckner reboots the franchise with jamie clayton as a female pinhead, and some fresh, frightening new ideas.

Director David Bruckner’s Hellraiser is not at all the same as Clive Barker’s 1987 original. That might seem obvious, but it’s important to note—if for no other reason than to help set expectations. Bruckner and his screenwriters Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski don’t seem altogether interested in the kind of psychosexual introspection that drove Barker’s film (or the novella it was based upon), instead leveraging the franchise’s iconography as a canvas for a different sort of psychological exploration.

As decades of rights-preserving sequels can attest, that choice is nothing new for the Hellraiser franchise, but fans of Barker’s queer proclivities may be disappointed that this 2022 version marks another propagation rather than a return to its roots. That said, Bruckner, Collins, and Piotrowski plant their vision in fields that are no less rich, terrifying, or gorily violent than the hellbound story that started it all.

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The new film stars Odessa A’zion as Riley, a drug addict struggling with recovery while living in the apartment of her brother Matt (Brandon Flynn) and his boyfriend Colin (Adam Faison). When Riley’s boyfriend and fellow addict Trevor (Drew Starkey) enlists her help on a warehouse break-in, she reluctantly agrees, recovering only a strange puzzle box as the sole piece of loot. But after Matt confronts her about being intoxicated, Riley storms out to sleep in her car, inadvertently solving the first stage of the box while succumbing to a pill-induced haze. Matt soon finds her, but cuts himself on the box in the process, becoming its next victim. When its monsters emerge and claim him, Riley decides to investigate the box further, in the hopes of finding clues that lead to her brother.

Consequently, Collins and Piotrowski transplant Barker’s fascination with the sensory BDSM extremes of pleasure and pain to the escapism and trauma of drug addiction—and it’s a surprisingly good fit for the material. A’zion delivers a powerful linchpin performance here, as Riley’s addiction and the enabling influence of a friend are not just harmful physically but socially as well when her closest familial relationship becomes a literal casualty. It’s a shockingly well-realized metaphor that reconceptualizes solving the puzzle box as a perpetual high to be chased, leaving behind a trail of destruction as the Cenobites become acolytes to a god of euphoric pain.

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The Cenobites themselves are fascinatingly realized, with reality-bending entrances simultaneously reminiscent of a puzzle box, not to mention Bruckner’s previous work on The Night House . Their eerie redesigns strip away Barker’s BDSM fetishism—no longer as shocking to mainstream audiences as it was in 1987—in favor of mutilated flesh that turns their actual skin into the leather of their bondage. Though these monsters are occasionally underlit too severely to fully view their designs, the actors fascinatingly perform the roles as simultaneously single-minded, bestial, pious, and reverent. Taking over the role of series staple Pinhead, Jamie Clayton carries the same unwieldy but provocative combination of sensuality and menace as Doug Bradley did, but her alien disdain for differentiating between pain and pleasure not only sets her apart but reinforces this film’s deeper themes.

Despite those differences, this incarnation of Hellraiser delivers just as much bloody spectacle as its predecessor. Victims are once again rendered into raw meat by the franchise’s signature chains, but a variety of other torture devices, including barbed wire and needles, somehow never manage to transform them into anything quite as viscerally wet as the original film’s skinless killer. This is a film about psychic wounds made physical, so Bruckner frames scenes of violence as empathetic as they are painful, to extremely successful effect.

Conversely, the film’s shortcomings feel mostly like a byproduct of too many ideas which, when explored, slow the pacing of the storytelling after the first act. Riley’s investigation into the puzzle box and its previous owner opens a thorough and well-conceived mythology, but the screenplay seems almost too excited to show its world-building work, and as a consequence, that table-setting causes an extended lull between kills. Furthermore, a third-act subplot that draws parallels between substance abuse and the hedonistic pursuit of power is not only compelling, but timely, but it tips the focus from the Cenobites to a more benign villain whose presence undercuts Riley’s character arc.

That said, there’s a palpable love and dedication from all of the principal creatives for the material, which largely excuses their impulse to overstuff the film with ways to rebuild and expand it after so many lackluster installments. The filmmakers may divide the franchise’s fans by choosing not to plumb the same sadomasochistic depths of the original film, but this new version is its own heart-wrenching descent into a different kind of hell, and it’s a worthy successor to the name Hellraiser that reinvents its iconography in a new era and context. And despite the pain of leaving the past behind, Bruckner’s film paves the way for new, unexpected, and potentially even richer cinematic pleasures.

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Even a Wicked New Pinhead Can’t Bring ‘Hellraiser’ Salvation

With a painfully overt allegory and a cast of underdeveloped, uninteresting characters, one of the most memorable horror films ever becomes a paint-by-numbers slasher.

Coleman Spilde

Entertainment Critic

Spyglass Media Group

Every October, horror fans are treated to the acute displeasure of having to wade through the season’s selection of streamer-dumped genre content in search of any gems, lest they fall through the cracks and get lost forever. This can sometimes lead to exciting discoveries, things that are still flying under the radar after an extremely limited theatrical release, or bold and exciting projects from first-time directors that go for broke on gonzo gore (even if they aren’t all the most narratively sound).

And any horror fan will tell you, the hunt is part of the fun. One of the many reasons that the genre is so beloved is that, even when it’s bad, it’s oh-so good. Spending 90 minutes on the couch with a terrible horror movie does not equate to spending the same amount of time with an unfunny comedy or a snooze-worthy drama. The experience might be painful, but it’s also highly pleasurable.

That same sliding scale between pleasure and pain is the guiding force of the Cenobites, the demonic beings in Clive Barker’s iconic 1987 B-movie, Hellraiser . The Cenobites, led by their nameless leader—affectionately nicknamed Pinhead after its release by the franchise’s fans—are “explorers in the further regions of experience.” When summoned by a puzzle box, the Cenobites appear to collect their caller and take them to some netherworld: neither Heaven nor Hell, but filled with endless torture.

The film spawned a whopping nine sequels, while a proper reboot remained ironically in a production hell of its own since 2006. That is, until now, with the Barker-coproduced resurrection landing on Hulu Friday. The new Hellraiser is billed as a “take” on the original film, a different story with the same core principles, updated for a generation for whom pain and pleasure seem to run in tandem at all times.

With the horror genre more mainstream than ever—and endless material to pluck from the culture-at-large to make the film’s themes even more discomforting—this new Hellraiser could’ve been a chance to draft a new legion of devotees to the Cenobites. But aside from some fantastic demon sequences and admirable practical effects, Hellraiser squanders its iniquitous potential in favor of tired horror tropes and a painfully overt allegory that weighs it down to the depths of rebooted horror hell.

The new film, like the 1987 original, opens with a sequence that lays out the rules. A mysterious puzzle box is found in the house of an eccentric billionaire, Roland Voight (Goran Visnjic), by a guest at one of his lavish parties. Curious, the partygoer toys with the box and solves its current configuration, triggering a blade that pops out from the box and cuts through his hand. His blood calls the Cenobites, and, moments later, he’s a prisoner hooked in their chains.

Six years later, Riley (Odessa A’zion), a twentysomething burnout, is trying her best to stay clean. She lives with her brother, Matt (Brandon Flynn); his boyfriend, Colin (Adam Faison); and their roommate, Norah (Aoife Hinds); and worries them all with her constant comings and goings. When Riley brings home a hunky new beau, Trevor (Drew Starkey), from a 12-step meeting, the group is even more suspicious.

Seemingly intent on helping Riley skirt recovery and responsibility, Trevor suggests they rob an old shipping container that was left in a warehouse by a rich antique dealer. They discover the puzzle box in its original configuration and take it home, obviously while on a bender. Fed up with his sister’s behavior, Matt kicks Riley out. She takes the puzzle box with her. Hours later, in a haze of regret, Matt searches for Riley and finds her on a playground, drifting in and out of consciousness. When he tries to pry the box from her hand, he mistakenly completes a configuration and stabs himself with its blade.

By the time Riley comes to, Matt has disappeared, leaving nothing but his blood in the sink of a nearby bathroom. Determined to trace the puzzle box back to its origins, Riley must confront her own demons. In order to discover the mystery behind the box, she must make amends with her friends—all while being trailed by the Cenobites, who need new victims and offer Riley life’s greatest pleasures in return for offering them up.

If that sounds like a heavy-handed metaphor for the struggles of addiction, ding ding ding! You’ve nailed this reboot’s overt allegory, joining other recent entries in the oh-so-obvious canon like Halloween (PTSD!), The Invisible Man (domestic violence!), and Scream (being terminally online!). Unlike 2013’s fantastic Evil Dead reboot—which also tackled drug addiction by depicting the visceral horrors of withdrawal— Hellraiser eventually abandons its entire allegorical setup. The result is that one of the most brutally memorable horror films of all time becomes a largely by-the-numbers slasher.

We’re given little to no idea of who the characters in this reboot are and what’s going on in their inner lives. Two are gay, one is a brother, one’s a stud, and another is…a roommate? Beyond those commonplace descriptors, they have zero distinguishable traits. Which begs the question, why is the Hellraiser of 2022 a whole 40 minutes longer than the original, yet feels so much more hollow?

If a horror movie stretches past the two-hour mark, it has to earn it. The original film does so much with so little that it’s downright gobsmacking. It gets its exposition out of the way almost instantly and doesn’t make a huge rigamarole out of the mystery box logistics. It’s quick, sickeningly creepy, and absolutely disgusting—just what any Hellraiser movie should be!

For all of its sleepiness, the new reboot does briefly come alive (or should I say, reanimate) whenever Pinhead and the Cenobites emerge from their outer dimension to grace the audience with their wicked perversions. The movie borrows a couple of creatures from the original film, updating their design but thankfully keeping the practical effects and makeup that make them so hauntingly nightmarish. There’s even a new Pinhead, played by Jamie Clayton, who finally gives the Cenobites’ High Priest the dose of feminine energy it deserves—despite the whole gender-averse deity of Hell thing.

Each of the Cenobites sequences is completely gripping; their low, modified voices shred nerves as easily as their chains, hooks, and various torture devices cut through their victims' skin. When Pinhead callously asks, “What is it you pray for?” as one such casualty begins to recite the Lord’s Prayer, it’s a deliciously depraved reminder of what makes Hellraiser ’s conceit so startlingly blasphemous. The films prey on our intrinsic fear of annihilation, suggesting that it’s useless to spend so long coveting salvation when we should instead accept that the very existence of a soul means it will forever waver between good and evil.

The new Hellraiser soars every time it lets itself briefly rest in the muck of entropy, only to be pulled back down to earth by its meagerly written characters, who don’t have nearly enough bite to be reviving a franchise. What’s more, the film falls short with its representation of modern immorality. The occult panic of the 1980s still feels palpable watching the original film, and this new Hellraiser misses a grand opportunity to recapture that queasiness in its wealthy, insatiable, Jeffrey Epstein-inspired vile magnate who holds the key to the puzzle box’s mysteries.

Even with some delightfully ungodly sequences, the long-awaited Hellraiser reboot fails to recreate the same dark magic that the original so deftly harnessed. Pinhead told us in 1987, “Some things have to be endured, that’s what makes the pleasures so sweet.” Let’s hope that rings true when the puzzle box is opened again in Hellraiser ’s inevitable sequel.

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Hellraiser Review

11 Sep 1987

Horror is at its best when it's relentless. Clive Barker knows this, and his debut feature as director is so gleefully vicious, so relentlessly grim that it's going to be very hard for fans of the genre not to like it. But then they were already through the box office doors with the tagline - "He'll tear your soul apart."

After a bravura inroductory sequence showing the creation of the aptly named and destined-to-be-horror-icon 'Pinhead', it's onto the depraved, nasty little sod, Frank. Having stolen the key to hell, he promptly opens it, and his soul takes up residence in the company of the 'Cenobites' (S&M demons every bit as painful as they sound). Several years pass before his corpse is awakened by a drop of blood, and he's found a way back to this world. He finds an accomplice in his former mistress - his femme fatale sister-in-law, who is still married to his nice, normal, but in their eyes, dull brother Larry. Before you can say "behind you", Larry's taken Frank's place, and it's up to his daughter to discover a way to rescue him.

The sheer weirdness makes this, for the most part, fly by. One for fans who like their horror messy, this has more hooks than an angling superstore, and is not for the squeamish. But then, how many horror fans are?

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Screen Rant

Rogert ebert's picks for the 10 worst horror movies of all time.

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All 66 Stephen King Books Ranked From Worst To Best

The 25 best body horror movies of all time ranked, 10 horror books that terrified me, and i usually don't get scared.

Ebert had no mercy for low-budget horror films, giving scathing reviews to like "The Guardian" and "Halloween III."
He criticized the lack of originality and poor production in horror sequels like "Critters 2" and "Resident Evil: Apocalypse."
Obscure horror films like "The Devil's Rain" and "Hellbound: Hellraiser II" fell short of Ebert's expectations, receiving low ratings.

Famed film critic Roger Ebert knew how to give a film that failed to live up to expectations its just desserts, especially when it came to horror . One of the most famous and beloved movie reviewers of all time, Roger Ebert clearly didn't have an equal love for all genres, with horror being particularly low on his list of favorites. In particular, he famously disregarded the slasher genre , which he derogatorily referred to as " dead teenager films ." Thus, it's no surprise that horror movies feature heavily on Ebert's list of most hated films .

Roger Ebert truly offered no quarter to low-budget or poorly-thought-out horror movies, which typically have a zealous fanbase willing to forgive a lot in the name of a good scare. Whether it was a prestige drop from a visionary director like M. Night Shyamalan's filmography or simply the latest in a long-line of commercially viable franchise films, Ebert could be truly ruthless with his criticism of scary movies. With how well he was able to articulate his thoughts, it's hard to argue with many of his takes on the following films.

Collage of a closeup of Stephen King ad of him writing at his desk

Over the course of his literary career, Stephen King has crafted 66 novels and over 200 short stories, but how do his books rank against one another?

10 The Guardian

Ebert's rating: 1 star.

The Guardian (2006)

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The Guardian is an action-drama film directed by Andrew Davis. It stars Kevin Costner as a veteran rescue swimmer who trains new recruits after a tragic incident. Ashton Kutcher plays a young, brash recruit who joins the elite Coast Guard unit. The film explores themes of mentorship, sacrifice, and resilience within the perilous world of sea rescues.

Not to be confused with the 2006 action-adventure drama starring Kevin Costner, The Guardian is a forgotten horror film that made the ranks of Ebert's worst-ever list. The second horror film by director William Friedkin following the critically-acclaimed possession piece The Exorcist , the movie follows a pair of young parents who hire a mysterious nanny to help with the task of raising their two children. Things quickly go awry when the couple realizes that their new hired help is actually an ancient and vengeful nature spirit.

Roger Ebert criticized the premise of the film, mocking the clear disconnect between the forested precipice the couple's house sits on and the geography of what is clearly Los Angeles. From there, he praised the technical filmmaking while expressing a distinct tiredness with which he saw The Guardian as an unsightly bump in Friedkin's uneven filmography. Despite its originality, the tale of a druidic evil wasn't enough to pique Roger Ebert's interest.

9 13 Ghosts

Thirteen Ghosts

Thirteen Ghosts is a horror film directed by Steve Beck. The story revolves around a family that inherits a mysterious mansion from a deceased relative. Inside the house, they discover a complex machine designed to open the eye of hell, while being haunted by twelve volatile spirits. The cast includes Tony Shalhoub, Embeth Davidtz, and Matthew Lillard, who must navigate the perilous environment to save themselves.

A rare debut film for a director that is also a remake of an old classic, 13 Ghosts is perhaps the lowest-regarded of beloved actor Matthew Lillard's close encounters with the spooky and supernatural. Lillard stars as the resident psychic in a crew of ghost hunters who seek to capture evidence of a fearsome ghost said to be prowling the premises of an ancient mansion. It's not long before the feared Juggernaut spirit is joined by 12 other unique spirits, fulfilling the premise of the film's haunting title.

" Literally painful. It hurts the eyes and ears. "

Like many other reviewers that contributed to the film's abysmal Rotten Tomatoes score, Roger Ebert was more than unimpressed by the horror remake. Ebert described the film's audacious sound design and visual cues as " Literally painful. It hurts the eyes and ears. ", suspecting such choices were made to cover up the knowingly-thin plot and lackluster final editing choices. While he could admit the film had some level of impressive production design and visuals , the screenplay and audio mix were enough to deter him expeditiously.

8 Critters 2: The Main Course

A critter bites some wires in Critters 2

A sequel to a thinly-veiled ripoff of the child-friendly Gremlins movies , Critters 2: The Main Course feels like it has no business being reviewed by a critical mind as respected as Roger Ebert's. Regardless, the film finds itself on Ebert's shortlist of the worst that horror and science fiction have to offer. Bringing back the titular creatures, Critters 2: The Main Course takes place two years after the events of the first film, revealing a new batch of Critter eggs that soon hatch and wreak havoc on the town of Grover's Bend.

Ebert was never one to give films a break for budgetary constraints, and laid into Critters 2: The Main Course for its hokey special effects. He remarked how " It is quite obvious, in many shots, that the critters [...] are lined up along the edges of tables and other flat surfaces so that unseen puppeteers can operate them ." , bemoaning the loss of personality and production value compared to the first movie's version of the monsters. Even if Ebert could have appreciated Critters , its poorly-conceived spawn deserved nothing but malice.

7 The Devil's Rain

Ebert's rating: 1 1/2 stars.

A supernatural horror story fueled by religious terror with an ensemble cast, it might be surprising to learn that The Devil's Rain was so poorly-received by Roger Eberts. Starring big names like William Shatner and John Travolta , the film follows a close-knit family haunted by their connections to a satanic priest . What follows is an all-out war between the Preston family and the demonic cult following the charismatic Jonathan Corbis.

Roger Ebert's voice was just one part of the choir of universally negative reviews that bombarded The Devil's Rain upon its release. Specifically, Ebert pointed out the drawn out shots of Western landscapes that padded out the film's needlessly long feature runtime, something that couldn't be sustained by the strength of its concept alone. An extra half star may be rewarded for a few elements Ebert praised, such as the costumes and key performances, but overall, the beloved critic rained on The Devil's Rain 's parade.

6 Halloween III: Season Of The Witch

Ebert's rating: 1 and 1/2 stars.

Halloween III: Season of the Witch

Halloween 3: Season of the Witch is a sci-fi horror film that acts as the third film in the original Halloween films that started in the 1970s. The first and only Halloween film not to feature Michael Myers as the villain, Halloween 3 instead focuses on witchcraft. When a man escapes with a strange jack-o-lantern mask while on the run from mysterious men in suits, the truth is that these masks kill children when they put them on. Protagonists Daniel and Ellie decide to discover the truth behind the manufacturer, the Silver Shamrock company, but what awaits them is a confrontation out of this world.

By far the most infamous entry in the long-running Halloween franchise , Halloween III: Season of the Witch made the controversial decision to remove Michael Myers altogether, going back to John Carpenter's original plans for the series to be an anthology with an entirely new story. This might not have drawn the ire of critics and horror fans alike if it wasn't for the threequel's absurd premise. The plot of Halloween III: Season of the Witch revolves around an evil plot to control children with magical Halloween masks.

Ebert seemed to almost ironically enjoy the absurdity of Halloween III: Season of the Witch 's story, balking at the Bond-esque mad scientist lair and countless references to better horror movies. Like other critics, Ebert also pointed out the nonsensical nature of the villain's plan, the impetus of which never gets a clear answer in the film. Still, the famed reviewer was at least able to award a genuine 1/2 star for Stacy Nelkin's performance as the horror heroine.

5 The Deathmaster

Roger Ebert prefaced his review of The Deathmaster with a brief history lesson regarding the film's creation. Producer Roger Corman commissioned the film solely to take advantage of actor Robert Quarry's remaining contracted days, painting an ominous picture of the slapdash horror picture's ability to creatively succeed. The Deathmaster posits Quarry as a cult leader named Khorda who is secretly a vampire, plotting nefarious schemes for his horde of human followers.

Hilariously, Ebert uses his review to estimate exactly how long Quarry was on the hook for during the production of The Deathmaster, guessing a mere couple of weeks judging by the film's coverage and final performances. While Ebert praised what Quarry was able to do as a vampire performer, he relentlessly mocked the talent of the supporting cast, whose characters he explained to be particularly unintelligent. Ebert elaborated, " They are so dumb, in fact, that they have had to learn to speak the English language by watching old AIP exploitation movies, and their dialog is eight years out of date. "

4 Resident Evil

Resident Evil

Infamously, Ebert once made controversial former statements that asserted video games can never be art. Thus, it's no surprise that a horror movie based off a game long before the "video game curse" was broken failed to move him critically. Loosely based off of Capcom's highly-popular survival horror series, Resident Evil is a futuristic monster movie that follows Milla Jovovich and Michelle Rodriguez's efforts to take on the insidious Umbrella corporation's genetic monstrosities.

Ebert was quick to point out how the film never even seems bothered to properly name Jovovich and Rodriguez's characters, who are credited with varying names in official material. He also didn't go easy on the dialogue, remarking that " T he characters have no small talk. Their dialogue consists of commands, explanations, exclamations and ejaculations. " While he could admire some of the film's creativity in its creature design, Ebert was ultimately unimpressed by Resident Evil.

3 The Village

The Village

Directed by M. Knight Shyamalan, The Village is set in a small Pennsylvania village in the 1800s. Residents of the village live in fear of sinister creatures living in the woods around them, leading them to be very isolationist, not allowing people to leave. The film follows a young couple who attempt to leave the village in order to procure medical supplies from the surrounding towns. Bryce Dallas Howard and Joaquin Phoenix star as the couple, Ivy and Lucius, with a further cast that includes Adrien Brody, William Hurt, Sigourney Weaver, and Brendan Gleeson.

Considered by many to be the beginning of M. Night Shyamalan's cinematic downfall, Roger Ebert was one of many voices to disparage The Village. The film takes place in an isolated, rural community in the early 19th century beset by mysterious monsters that emerge from the woods, with all the villagers following strict rules to avoid their ire. The Village is famous for containing one of Shyamalan's most audacious and disrespectful twist endings ever.

" It's so witless, in fact, that when we do discover the secret, we want to rewind the film so we don't know the secret anymore ."

Compared to other low-rated horror films that Ebert seemed to only have a tired disinterest in, the well-respected critic was furious about Shyamalan's ending to The Village. He punctuated his frustrations by claiming " It's so witless, in fact, that when we do discover the secret, we want to rewind the film so we don't know the secret anymore ." Beyond the ending, Ebert was also brought to despair by the lack of emotion in the performances and the dreary tone.

2 Resident Evil: Apocalypse

Ebert's rating: 1/2 a star, resident evil: apocalypse.

It seems absurd that Roger Ebert would take the time to review not just one, but two films in the gruesome action-shlock mess that is the Resident Evil film franchise . Yet here Resident Evil: Apocalypse stands, scraping the bottom of the barrel of Ebert's horror and science fiction movie recommendations. This time around, the Umbrella Corporation has unleashed yet another zombie plague on Raccoon City, and the heroes struggle to rescue the daughter of a powerful official that can extract them before the entire metropolitan area is blown to smithereens.

Ebert has little constructive criticism to offer Resident Evil: Apocalypse , calling it " a dead zone, a film without interest, wit, imagination or even entertaining violence and special effects. " His prose regarding the film reads so tired that he even quoted his review of the previous movie, and clearly cared little to dissect the failings of what he viewed as a cynical cash grab. For its sins, Resident Evil: Apocalypse enjoys the lowliest standing of even Ebert's most hated horror features with only a measly half star.

1 Hellbound: Hellraiser II

Hellbound: hellraiser ii.

The Hellraiser franchise isn't exactly critically acclaimed for its countless sequels, and Roger Ebert's thoughts on the first of them makes it clear as to why. Hellbound: Hellraiser II picks up mere hours after the original leaves off, with the traumatized Kristy reeling in the hospital from her terrifying encounter with the sadomasochistic Cenobites. It isn't long before the halls of her hospital become the layers of hell itself, and Kristy finds herself once again helpless in another infernal nightmare.

Ebert was never one to enjoy gore for gore's sake, and dismisses Hellbound: Hellraiser II as " simply a series of gruesome images that can be watched in any order. " Aside from the overload of disturbing imagery, Ebert also didn't miss the film's lazy construction, finding ironic humor in the over-reliance of protagonists Kristy and Tiffany simply shouting each other's names over and over again while wandering the annals of hell. For the lack of story, Hellbound: Hellraiser II finds itself as the most reviled subject of Ebert's horror movie reviews.

Horror Movies

10 Disgustingly Perfect '90s Body Horror Movies

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With its roots stemming from early 20th-century literature such as H.G. Wells' The Island of Dr. Moreau and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein , body horror is characterized by gruesome body transformations and mutations. The genre rose to prominence in the world of cinema during the ‘70s and ‘80s. Utilizing innovative practical effects, body horror movies like The Fly, The Thing, and Hellraiser have since gone on to become considered classics within the horror genre.

As the ‘90s hit, technological advancements and the rise of CGI meant that many directors focused more on sleek and visually polished special effects. As a result, the body horror genre and its more physically tangible, visceral style witnessed a decline.

However, that’s not to say a number of classics of the genre weren’t released during the decade with some directors sticking to their roots and continuing to use practical effects and others skillfully combining them with the CGI of the moment. Below are the 10 best body horror movies of the ‘90s.

10 The Island of Dr. Moreau (1996)

The Island of Dr. Moreau

Based on H.G Wells’ 1896 classic novel, The Island of Dr. Moreau , is about a mysterious scientist who is conducting gruesome experiments involving human-animal hybrids, on a remote island. The story explores the ethical issues surrounding the science and notion of ‘playing God.’

The Island of Dr. Moreau Is Based on One of the Early Body Horror Novels

Following two previous adaptations of the novel, the 1996 version failed to live up to expectations, and while the story remains timeless, the execution was considered inferior to previous iterations, with the movie scoring only 22% on Rotten Tomatoes. While it had its fans, many critics were particularly disappointed in what they considered to be subpar acting from big names like Marlon Brando and Val Kilmer.

9 In the Mouth of Madness (1995)

In the Mouth of Madness

Not available

No stranger to body horror, director John Carpenter is revered among fans of the genre for his ground-breaking work on the 1982 classic The Thing . This time around, with In The Mouth of Madness , the filmmaker pays homage to the works of H.P. Lovecraft in his exploration of insanity and the human condition.

In the Mouth of Madness Blurs The Lines Between Fiction and Reality

Following the story of an insurance investigator on the hunt for a missing author, the investigator finds himself in the peculiar town of Hobb’s End where the lines between reality and fiction blur as it becomes apparent the authors’ works are more than mere fantasy. Residents of the town gradually twist, contort, and morph into all manner of nightmarish forms, creating a chilling movie with a truly uncomfortable atmosphere.

8 Species (1995)

Despite its impressive cast of respected actors including Ben Kingsley, Michael Madsen, and Forest Whitaker, it’s advisable not to go into Species expecting a highly sophisticated display of fine art. Species is shlocky, over the top, and somewhat ridiculous, but it’s still a rollicking good time.

Species Is as Fun as It Is Silly

The plot revolves around a ragtag group of scientists on the hunt for an alien-human hybrid creature who is looking to seduce and mate with a human male companion and create a highly dangerous offspring. It throws in a few scares, a couple of laughs, and some solid CGI and practical special effects, resulting in a great source of entertainment for genre fans.

Stream on Fubo

7 Tetsuo II: Body Hammer (1992)

The original Tetsuo movie, The Iron Man , was released in 1989 and is widely considered one of the most important and influential Japanese horror movies ever made and a staple of any die-hard body horror fan’s collection. It’s not surprising, then, that a sequel was greenlit which arrived in the form of Tetsuo II: Body Hammer in 1992.

With Its Focus on the Fusion of Flesh and Metal, Tetsuo 2: Body Hammer Is the Quintessential Body Horror Movie

The movie focuses on a man whose body begins to slowly transform into a deadly weapon after he releases a huge surge of rage when his son is kidnapped. The film's nightmarish imagery coupled with its exploration of the loss of bodily autonomy and the invasion of technology into human form makes it a must-see for those who enjoy the more intensely visceral aspects of the genre.

6 Body Melt (1994)

Combining clever satire with revolting body horror, Body Melt , is a fantastic Australian indie gem. It tells the story of a town that is introduced to free supplements pills, which just so happen to have some pretty extreme side effects. These side effects range from elongated tongues and exploding body parts to monstrous births and tentacle growths and much, much more!

Body Melt Is a Shocking Social Satire

The movie was praised for its schlocky B-Movie charm, its impressive and gruesome practical effects, and its satirization of extreme healthy living and the diet and supplement pill trend.

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5 Bride of Re-Animator (1990)

Loosely based on the serialized story Herbert West–Reanimator by H. P. Lovecraft, Bride of Re-Animator is the sequel to 1985’s cult classic Re-Animator . This time around Dr. Herbet West and Dr. Cain return to continue their twisted corpse reanimation experiments as they seek to create the perfect woman using various dismembered body parts. All the while, the reanimated, disembodied head of DR. Carl Hill, from the original movie, is out for revenge on the doctors.

A Respectable Sequel to One of the Genre’s Most Celebrated Movies

While failing to reach the critical success of the first movie, it has more than enough humor, horror, and gross-out special effects to keep fans of the original satisfied. Despite middling reviews, it has since gone on to achieve cult status among fans of horror comedy and body horror.

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4 Event Horizon (1997)

Event Horizon

Directed by Paul W.S. Anderson and starring Laurence Fishburne, Event Horizon is a sci-fi horror that follows a group of astronauts as they investigate a spaceship that has mysteriously reappeared several years after it was reported missing. It turns out the ship had been transported to another dimension and returned, bringing with it a malevolent entity intent on destroying all those in its path.

Despite Mixed Reviews, Event Horizon Is Now Considered a Cult Classic

Blending sci-fi with supernatural horror, the film was praised for its intense atmosphere and visual effects. However, it failed to impress some critics who accused the movie of relying on style over substance, pointing out the basic and cliché-ridden plotline. Nevertheless, the movie has since garnered a strong cult following who appreciate its splatterings of intense violence and grotesque body horror elements brought to life masterfully through a combination of practical effects and CGI.

3 Dead Alive (1992)

Now one of Hollywood’s most successful and celebrated directors, Peter Jackson started off making low-budget ultra-violent horror movies in his home country of New Zealand . His third feature film, Dead Alive ( aka Braindead ) is about a young man who is bitten by a monkey-rat creature and begins to transform into a zombie.

Dead Alive is One of the World’s Goriest Films

Never taking itself too seriously, and at times even slipping into the realms of slapstick and absurdity, Dead Alive is crammed full of impressive practical effects as viewers witness hundreds of residents getting infected by the young man. As the town becomes overrun by these flesh-eating zombies, carnage ensues, resulting in arguably the bloodiest movie ever made.

2 eXistenZ (1999)

Video game designer Allegra Geller (Jennifer Jason Leigh) has created a virtual reality game called eXistenZ. After a crazed fan attempts to kill her, Allegra goes on the run with Ted (Jude Law), a young businessman who falls into the role of bodyguard. In an attempt to save her game, Allegra implants into Ted's body the video game pod that carries a damaged copy of eXistenZ. Allegra and Ted engage in a series of experiences that blur the lines between fantasy and reality.

eXistenZ is an exhilarating trip into the unknown as audiences bear witness to a game designer being hunted down by a relentless assassin inside the confines of a virtual reality of her own creation. With frequent comparisons to The Matrix , it incorporates similar themes and takes them in an altogether stranger direction with a movie that combines an intricate, thought-provoking narrative with some of cinema's most horrifying body horror effects.

Existenz Forces Viewers to Constantly Question What They Believe to Be True

By using a virtual reality setting, viewers are challenged to reevaluate their perceptions as they grapple with the shifting nature of the truth within the confines of Cronenberg’s mind-bending reality. With Cronenberg’s twisted imagination able to run amuck, critics were impressed by the unconventional story, special effects, and acting, and it earned him the Silver Bear Award for Outstanding Artistic Contribution at the 49th Berlin International Film Festival.

1 Cronos (1993)

Cronos (1993)

Before the Oscar wins and international fame, director Guillermo Del Toro was working on his debut movie, Omnivore , a stop-motion sci-fi picture. Unfortunately, the studio was burglarized and vandalized resulting in the destruction of movie sets and over 100 puppets to be used in the film. Following the blow, Del Torro decided to try his hand at live-action and Cronos was unleashed onto the world in 1993.

A Master of His Craft

Managing to be gory and terrifying as well as charming and full of intelligent religious subtext, the horror fantasy tells the story of a man who stumbles across an ancient scarab-like device which grants him eternal light. Not all is as it seems, though, as he develops a taste for blood and begins to undergo a series of grotesque transformations.

The movie’s visual effects are jaw-dropping which is hardly surprising considering Del Toro studied special effects under the legendary Dick Smith and spent 10 years as a special-effects make-up designer.

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Movie Lists

This Long-Awaited Stephen King Vampire Movie Is Finally Coming to Max

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The Big Picture

Gary Dauberman's Max adaptation of the classic Stephen King vampire novel Salem's Lot is back from the dead.
The film stars Lewis Pullman as Ben Mears, who uncovers a sinister presence in his hometown.
Originally slated for theatrical release, Salem's Lot faced delays but will now premiere on Max this October for horror fans to enjoy.

After years of being buried alive by Max, Salem's Lot is finally rising from the grave this fall. Gary Dauberman 's adaptation of the classic Stephen King vampire novel will be released on the streaming service in October. Lewis Pullman and Alfre Woodard star in the tale of a town overrun with the undead.

Directed, written, and executive produced by Dauberman ( Annabelle Comes Home ), the film stars Pullman as Ben Mears, a writer who returns to his hometown of Jerusalem's Lot, Maine, hoping to find inspiration for his next book. There, he reconnects with old friends, and makes new ones - but soon discovers that something sinister is working its way into the fabric of the town. That evil is Kurt Barlow, a centuries-old Austrian vampire who is slowly transforming the townspeople into an army of the undead. Only Ben and his friends can stop Barlow and his minions before they completely overrun the town. It also stars Makenzie Leigh , Bill Camp , Spencer Treat Clark , Pilou Asbæk , and John Benjamin Hickey . It is a production of James Wan 's Atomic Monster production company, a reliable horror factory in recent years.

Has 'Salem's Lot' Been Adapted Before?

The book was previously adapted for TV in 1979 as a two-part miniseries by The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 's Tobe Hooper ; it starred James Mason and David Soul . A loosely-connected theatrical sequel directed by b-movie maestro Larry Cohen , Return to Salem's Lot , followed in 1987. TNT adapted the novel into a miniseries again in 2004, with a cast that boasted heavy-hitters like Rob Lowe , Donald Sutherland , Andrew Braugher , and Rutger Hauer . The BBC also adapted the book into a radio drama in 1995, with Hellraiser 's Pinhead, Doug Bradley , providing the voice of the vampiric Barlow. King's short story "Jerusalem's Lot", a prequel to the novel, was adapted into the TV series Chapelwaite by Epix; starring Adrien Brody and Emily Hampshire , the series ran for a single season on the network in 2021.

Salem's Lot has undergone a hellish ordeal making it to the screen - even if it will be the small screen, rather than the big one as originally intended. Originally announced in 2019, its intended theatrical release was delayed first by the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, then by Warner Bros Discovery's brutal cost-cutting - the latter of which doomed the near-complete Batgirl movie. There was some concern that Salem's Lot would suffer a similar fate, much to the displeasure of King himself : the author praised the film, calling it "old-school horror filmmaking: slow build, big payoff".

Salem's Lot will arrive on Max this October ; a specific release date has not yet been announced. Stay tuned to Collider for future updates.

Salem's Lot (2024)

Author Ben Mears returns to his childhood home of Jerusalem's Lot in search of inspiration for his next book only to discover his hometown is being preyed upon by a bloodthirsty vampire.

Alfre Woodard

COMMENTS

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