Welcome to the Cutting Room

Ah, “Hellraiser.” The franchise that launched a thousand kinks. Originally written as the novella “The Hellbound Heart,” which I also recommend reading, Clive Barker adapted and directed his tale for the kinda sexy kinda gross horror hound in all of us. Modern horror owes a lot to “Hellraiser.” A lot of us owe a lot to “Hellraiser.” When I was a wee one I was scared of everything. Everything gave me nightmares. “Are You Afraid of the Dark?” Check. “Nightmare on Elm Street?” Don’t mind if I do. Literally any Danny Elfman soundtrack? I shit you not, I wish I was joking.

“Hellraiser” was always kind of the ultimate in terror to kid me; between Pinhead (Doug Bradley, a former classmate of Clive Barker and horror icon) and The Chatterer (Nicholas Vince, who wrote his own short origin story for the Chatterer as he appears in “The Hellbound Heart” titled “Look See,”) I was scared. Now, mind you, I wasn’t allowed to watch a lot of horror because my parents were very aware of my susceptibility to nightmares and put up with me waking them up to reassure me that no one was under my bed, no one was in my closet, etc. I had a wild imagination, though, and between freaking myself out in the horror section of my local video store and the Halloween masks I saw in catalogs I totally knew that “Hellraiser” was above kid me’s pay grade. I don’t remember the first time I watched “Hellraiser,” but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t until my early 20’s (so I can’t blame this one for my degeneracy). I must have watched at the perfect time though because it quickly became one of my favorites. The on and off-screen lore is extensive and I’m fully obsessed.

The first “Hellraiser” isn’t all about the Cenobites (hedonistic, amoral extra dimensional entities who are on an eternal quest for ultimate sensation. You know, the usual.) and the fun ways they torture people, as kid-me dreaded. In fact, the cenobites only appear for about 10 minutes or so throughout. The original “Hellraiser” is about an affair gone horribly awry. I’m not going to do spoiler alerts in this post because the movie was released a year before I was (from the womb. Har har).

“Hellraiser” starts with the rakish hedonist Frank Cotton (Sean Chapman) buying a mysterious sexy puzzle box from a shady dude at a shady market in Morocco, shadily. With a sense of foreboding, the seller implies that the box was “always” Frank’s. Seeking new thrills and definitely not ready for what he’s taken possession of, Frank summons the Cenobites by solving the puzzle box in an appropriately sexy and dramatic manner (alone in a dark room, shirtless, on his knees, surrounded by candles). Frank is subsequently violently torn apart by his new friends. Whomp whomp. In a flash, as the box is closed, all evidence of the Cenobites and miscellaneous viscera belonging to Frank disappears. OR DOES IT.

Enter Larry (Andrew Robinson) and Julia (Clare Higgins, fully stealing the show); Frank’s brother and his second wife, respectively. Larry and Julia are moving into the Cotton family home in the hopes of fixing their marriage (although we’re not immediately made aware of what needs fixing). Larry is Frank’s opposite in every way. He’s kind, he’s goofy, he has a wholesome loving relationship with his adult daughter Kirsty (Ashley Laurence). Julia has become cold and distant to Larry. Why, you ask? Well, because Frank and Julia had an affair before she and Larry married, of course! Apparently Frank blows Julia’s mind to the extent that she’s willing to do anything for him, and she really does mean anything.

Frank, pre being torn to shreds, squatted in the family home for who knows how long; he’s left the place in total disarray. That may not be entirely on him because, you know, getting ripped apart by beings from another dimension (but he probably wouldn’t have cleaned up after himself because he’s a bad boy). Julia becomes excited when she finds evidence of Frank and pockets a stack of personal pornographic photos from his abandoned belongings. Suddenly, she’s on board with moving into the family home.

Kirsty appears as Larry and Julia are moving in. She’s there to help, not to stay, as Kirsty and Julia have an icy relationship. Kirsty and Julia seem unable to connect with one another but attempt to get along for Larry’s sake.

Speaking of Larry, he cuts his hand on a nail while helping the movers and almost passes out (oh buddy, relatable). He goes to Julia for assistance while bleeding all over everything. Finding Julia where Frank was squatting, we see Larry’s blood soak into the floor and reanimate a tiny piece of tissue that survived the Cenobite Clean Up (some poor Cenobite janitor is gonna get fiiired). We’re treated to a super fun and gross scene showing Frank’s rebirth, and are left longing for the days of slimy goopy horror.

After a particularly awkward dinner party, the icy Julia goes upstairs, probably to check those photos out a little more (wink), and is confronted by her putrefied paramour. Understandably horrified, Julia takes some convincing that this pile of bones and goop is in fact her lover, but once she’s convinced she agrees to help Frank. After all, she said she’d do anything for him. Frank has come to the conclusion that if Larry’s blood brought him back as a living corpse, more blood would bring him back to being the Frank he once was. He also knows he’s in deep shit if the Cenobites find out he “survived.”

Julia begins picking up random men at bars to bring home the blood to Frank. At first one feels bad for the random men, but we see at least one of them get pushy with her so it’s hard to feel too bad. Taking a hammer to her hopeful hookup, Julia spills enough blood (which matches her lipstick. Can you say iconic?!) to get Frank looking like a skinless weirdo. It’s just not enough! At one point, Frank comes close to killing Larry, but as Julia clings to the last shred of fondness for her husband, she begs Frank to spare him.

After some convincing by her father, Kirsty heads to the house to hang out with her stepmother as a lame attempt to bond. Instead, she sees Julia bringing random men to her father’s house and is understandably concerned. Hearing screams inside the house, Kirsty rushes in to see Frank draining the life from one of Julia’s victims. True to form the lecherous Frank makes some super gross advances on his niece, but she escapes and throws his puzzle box out the window. Kirsty runs for her life, puzzle box in hand, and eventually passes out.

Kirsty regains consciousness in a hospital. She toys with the puzzle box, trying to figure out what the hell it is and why it’s so important to her creepy skinless uncle. Unfortunately, she opens it and is drawn into another world. She escapes (barely) and rushes to close the puzzle box, but she’s too late! The Cenobites confront Kirsty, who insists she only opened the box by accident. They are unmoved. Switching gears, Kirsty blows in her creepy skinless uncle to the Cenobites, alerting them to their unfinished business. She offers up Frank to the Cenobites so they won’t take her with them/tear her apart.

Remember how Julia begged Frank to spare Larry? Weeeell… Frank has fancy new skin! Whose skin? Larry’s skin! Kirsty returns home seeking comfort for her father but is tipped off that something is very wrong when he lasciviously tells her to “come to Daddy.” LarryFrank then kills Julia (let this be a lesson to all of us; never bring a bunch of random men to die so your weird skinless boyfriend can come back to life because he will betray you. Also don’t cheat, that’s fucked up. Justice for Larry.) and goes after Kirsty, either to kill her or assault her. Either way, gross. Instead, he’s confronted by Pinhead and Co. and finds himself in the same predicament he was in at their last meeting. Unwilling to give up his perversion in favor of repentance or pleas for mercy, LarryFrank licks his lips at Kirsty one more time before he’s torn apart.

Kirsty struggles to close the box and rid herself of the Cenobites but ultimately does, burning the Cotton family home to the ground in the process. She lives happily ever after OR DOES SHE. No. No she does not; She appears in three more films in the same universe so it’s safe to say. There’s also a DEMON DRAGON for some reason which was rad but unnecessary. The movie ends with the same shady guy in Morocco again selling the box to another hopeful hedonist on a quest for extremity.

The film was, as many are, hacked and slashed by censors, so we aren’t shown the full depravity of Barker’s vision, which is disappointing. The practical effects hold up surprisingly well and would definitely have scared the shit out of me had I seen them when I was less desensitized. I do also wish there was more backstory about the individual cenobites, but we are fed crumbs of their lore in subsequent entries in the series, a comic series, and of course “The Hellbound Heart.” Clive Barker wrote a follow-up novel in 2015 called “The Scarlet Gospels” which I haven’t read but want to. 2015 also brought us “Leviathan: The Story of Hellraiser and Hellbound: Hellraiser II,” an excellent documentary. It has an almost 8 hour runtime, but for obsessed fans (hello) it’s worth the watch. I’m sure I’m missing out on other tidbits of media from the “Hellraiser” universe, but would love to consume as much as possible. If you have any recommendations please help a sister out.

A cute fun fact from the film that I heard… Somewhere. Maybe in the documentary or reddit so I’m sure the accuracy is up for debate. Andrew Robinson, the actor playing Larry, didn’t want to cuss when he was torn apart as LarryFrank. Instead of the intended line, a final “fuck you,” Robinson ad-libbed the instantly recognizable “Jesus wept” that made the final cut.

“Hellraiser” rules. The original gets 4.5/5 from me.

As always, I recommend checking https://www.doesthedogdie.com/ for any triggers or things you don’t want to see before starting *any* horror movie.

All views expressed are my own, you don’t have to agree with them! I’m open to respectful discourse.

Feel free to leave any movie recommendations or anything you’d like to read a review of!