Tag: torture
“Oh, no tears please. It’s a waste of good suffering.”
– Hellraiser (1987)
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Saw III (2006)
After that brief interlude with Hostel, the main event of Saw-mhain returns with Saw III, a movie I may have seen before? Lot of half-formed memories, which means either I picked up details through osmosis or I had watched it and it just didn’t stick. And after watching/rewatching, it honestly could be either. This wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t super.
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Hostel (2005)
As it turns out, there aren’t enough Saw movies to have every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday in October dedicated to them. I’m left with three extra days during Saw-mhain, and you know what torture porn franchise has only three films? House of 1000 Corpses! And also Hostel, which is what we’re actually talking about today. And the first of the trilogy is… good? Better than expected, at least!
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Saw II (2005)
This year’s monthlong Halloween event, Saw-mhain, continues! Saw was incredibly successful, both in terms of cultural influence as well as profitability, so it makes sense that there’d be a sequel. But the very next year? That’s one hell of a turnaround, but this little franchise that could would continue doing that until the seventh film, confusingly titled Saw 3D. Also, this one is the first to be directed and co-written by Mr. Darren Lynn Bousman, who would return to the franchise several times. Hmmmm, why is that name familiar…?
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Saw (2004)
You didn’t think a little thing like a hiatus would stop me from celebrating the entire month of Halloween, did you? My tradition of a yearly October event lives on with Saw-mhain, a pun that works best if you know Irish /Gaeilge. Oh yes, the syllable break of Samhain (SAH-win) is Sa-mhain, because fuck you, that’s why. Gaeilge is a bastard language.
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Hellraiser (2022)
Last year for October I watched all the Hellraiser films as part of The Hellbound Halloween. That’s 10 movies about Pinhead and his fellow cenobites, with a brief break near the end because holy shit they somehow got progressively worse as time went on. So when I heard that the long-awaited Hellraiser reboot was dropping in October, I knew I had to talk about it. And so here we are on a Saturday while the weekdays are taken up by October of the Living Dead.
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Hellraiser: Judgment (2018)
All things must come to an end, and both the Hellbound Halloween event and the Hellraiser franchise count as part of “all things.” I’ve covered 9 movies about Hell and Pinhead (with a brief interlude of other stories by Mr. Clive Barker), and Hellraiser: Judgment is the last. It’s a bit of an over-exaggeration to say that the quality of the franchise decreased with every sequel, but the last half is more bad than good. Gary J Tunnicliffe–who also directed Hellraiser: Revelations–wanted to make a really good entry, and he ended up with two of the worst. Kind of like…
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Hellraiser: Revelations (2011)
Film rights are a can of worms. They are the reason the Marvel Cinematic Universe was created without mutants, despite the Avengers and X-Men both being owned by Marvel. It’s also partially why Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch are no longer Magneto’s children (as of time of writing, the Trial of Magneto may have a weird ending). Whenever you hear about film rights, it’s typically never a good sign. That’s the case with Hellraiser: Revelations, a rushed entry in the Hellraiser franchise made so Dimension could keep the film rights. The Hellbound Halloween has hit its lowest point. This is…
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Hellraiser: Deader (2005)
There’s something about franchises–particularly big horror franchises–where it sure seems like each one has a film that just refuses to stick in my head. I wrote about Children of the Corn: The Gathering just last year, but even then I still only remember the barest of details without looking at the post. Something about a fever…? In that same vein, was it Leprechaun 2 or Leprechaun 3 where he was at a pawn shop? And A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master is just a total blank to me. The point being I’ve seen all 10 Hellraiser films…
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Hellraiser: Hellseeker (2002)
I don’t want to come off as some sort of movie snob or purist. There are many different ways to tell a story, and sticking to a rigid structure is not always the best course of action. Case in point, Hellraiser: Inferno was a detective mystery that had some Hellish aspects, and I think it worked. But I guess Miramax thought they could try the same formula and create another interesting movie out of a script previously unrelated to the franchise. But no. Hellraiser: Hellseeker sucks and I hate it. Welcome back to the Hellbound Halloween. We’re officially in the…
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Hellraiser: Inferno (2000)
Whoa! We’re halfway there! The Hellbound Halloween continues with the fifth movie in the Hellraiser franchise, Hellraiser: Inferno. This is the first film in the series not to be released in theaters, and also the first where it’s really, really obvious that this was originally an unrelated script before the cenobites were tacked on. As a result the execution is… polarizing. It’s a very strange movie, but I think I can safely say it’s the best Silent Hill film yet!
Chwineka Watches 