*Get "Hellraiser: Revelations" on Amazon here*
*Get Hellraiser 6-Movie Collection on Amazon here*
*Get Hellraiser: Quartet of Torment on Amazon here*
*Get Books of Blood: Volumes 1-3 by Clive Barker on Amazon here*
When your option on continuing a once mildly successful horror film franchise is running out, do you let the series die a quiet and dignified death, since you haven't contributed anything to it in five years, or do you come up with a quickie entry that might make a buck or two on the video and streaming market? If you are Dimension, you crank out the garbage that is this film.
Nico (Jay Gillepsie, who looks like a young Val Kilmer) and Steven (Nick Eversman, who does not look like a young Val Kilmer) are two buddies who escape their privileged lives to Tijuana with a video camera along to record their adventures. The film begins jumping back and forth in time as we find out the boys end up missing and presumed dead, but their luggage made it back home along with the video camera (which wasn't kept by any authorities as evidence, despite footage of a possible murder) and a strange puzzle box. Nico's parents (Sebastien Roberts, Sanny Van Heteren) come over to dine with Steven's parents (Steven Brand, Devon Sorvari), and Steven's sister, and Nico's girlfriend, Emma (Tracey Fairaway). Got all that? In my notes, I had to construct a crude pedigree chart to keep the characters straight, especially since the parents all acted the same.
Dinner is tense since the parents ignore what happened to their sons until finally the ice is broken on the exact same night that Steven comes back home, bloodied and in a state of shock. The group is trapped in the isolated mansion, their cars mysteriously disappear, there is no phone service, and the viewer is treated to double doses of mayhem and murder as the story switches back and forth between what happened to Nico and Steven in Mexico, and what happens to their families now.
It had been over a quarter of a century since the original "Hellraiser", and despite a couple of better than average direct-to-video sequels, the overall series turned into a convoluted mess where some screenplays were injected with Pinhead and his Cenobites just to put them into a film and make it part of the "Hellraiser" franchise. Even Doug Bradley, who portrayed Pinhead in the preceding eight films, didn't see fit to return here- which isn't saying much, I guess, considering he did appear in the worst of the series before this film, as well as the best.
The film is dark and ugly. The screenwriter goes overboard (this is from the Dimension EXTREME label after all), and we get lots of gore, shootings, incest, murdered prostitutes, a baby killed offscreen, tequila shots, and bad story structure. The film runs only 75 minutes, with five minutes of that being opening and closing credits, yet the DVD's bonus feature is almost ten minutes of deleted scenes, which I couldn't bring myself to watch. Victor Garcia's direction is alright, after a stomach churning opening involving the two friends filming themselves on the trip. I didn't get sick from any gore, just the jolting camera movements that had me wishing I bought motion sickness medication the last time I was out. The majority of the action takes place around Steven's parents' house, with a dirty disgusting set standing in for Tijuana, which seems to be oddly populated by Asian prostitutes.
The performances here are pretty bad, but I am blaming the script. What used to sound so scary coming out of the mouth of Douglas Bradley sounds ridiculous coming out of Stephan Smith Collins'. There is a voice credit for Pinhead, and it sounds like Bradley a little, but Collins is stuck in this iconic role with nothing to do. The story pops in a vagrant character (Dan Buran) who happens to have the puzzle box that unleashes the demons, drops the vagrant character, then brings him back, and then drops him again. No explanation of Pinhead and the Cenobites is ever offered, and while having some mystery in a film is nice, even hardcore viewers like me have forgotten their origins. Simple questions like how long were the boys missing, and who actually controls the puzzle box and the summoning of the demons are left unanswered.
This made nine films in the franchise (which kept chugging along), and I had reviewed all of them, aside from some short fan films out there. "Hellraiser: Revelations" was the worst of the series to this point.
Stats:
(2011) 75 min. (1/10)
-Directed by Victor Garcia
-Story and Screenplay by Gary J. Tunnicliffe, based on characters created by Clive Barker
-Cast: Nick Eversman, Jay Gillepsie, Sebastien Roberts, Sanny Van Heteren, Steven Brand, Devon Sorvari, Tracey Fairaway, Stephan Smith Collins, Dan Buran, Steven Brand, Jolene Andersen, Camelia Dee, Sue Ann Pien
(R)
Media Viewed: DVD
