13 Nights of Hallowe'en 2009: Night #2 Hellraiser

For the second night of the thirteen I've chosen a classic, and

favourite of many, the original Hellraiser. I remember when I first rented it, though I do not know how long ago that was after it was released on VHS at the video store. Used to be quite some time between film release and video release, plus the rental stores always had a certain amount of time before movies would be sold to individuals. I was quite uncertain about seeing the film. A lot of talk circulated around that (blasphemously) considered Pinhead to be better than Freddy Krueger. Shocking I know, and hardly anything more than a personal preference--go Freddy! Hellraiser certainly did not fail to live up to the rest of the hype surrounding it. It was very edge of the seat stuff, a great testament to Clive Barker as director.

It's not very often that an author will direct the movie made based on

one of their books. Least of all are those films such smash hits. Pinhead of course is an incredibly iconic horror figure and stands easily alongside Freddy, Jason Voorhees, and Michael Myers. Pinhead also has some of the coolest antagonist lines in any movies. There are numerous lines of his in this movie that are eminently quotable. At the same time, they are not your typical one-liners, instead opting for the serious and not deadpan, but straight lines. Doug Bradley's voice and demeanour as Pinhead make the film almost as much as the scripts adherence to Barker's "The Hellbound Heart". Not that it follows everything for indeed Pinhead is much cooler than the novella's lead cenobite.

Mood: sardonic.

Music: Hellraiser by Ozzy Osbourne off of No More Tears.

13 Nights of Halloween: Night #7: Hellraiser: Deader

Tonight we come around a bit of a circle and have a movie that
follows one from a previous night. Tonight's movie is "Hellraiser: Deader" the seventh in the Hellraiser franchise. That's right, I'm skipping the sixth, though I by no means wish to knock that one--it's called Hellseeker. In a really nice change-up we have Pinhead Does Europe. Now that I think about it, I can't say where the other films would be placed geographically. They could have been in Britain, though that could still put this one in Europe proper since Deader starts in London and moves to Romania--in the movie.

One of the high points in horror movies for me and a definite motivator in praise of these films has to be what I call "nightmare moments". These moments are something straight out of a nightmare, or in some cases even better than a nightmare. Deader has a couple of these moments. I just had to sit there shaking my head going wow, now that is just wild, that is something right straight out of someone's worst nightmare. Aside from these moments, how does Deader compare to say Inferno, or the first movie? Well it has all the right spirit. It has the same kind of is this moment real and how real sensibility we saw in Inferno and Hellseeker. At the same time it is also what I could call canon, or in line with the original movie.

Mood: antsy.
Music: Welcome To My Nightmare by Alice Cooper.

13 Nights of Halloween: Night #4 Hellraiser: Inferno

Tonight's movie is one that totally blew my socks off. "Hellraiser:
Inferno" is the fifth film in the Hellraiser franchise following on the heels of Bloodlines. Sequels can be mixed bags. Some people hate them with a passion. Many say that they never live up to the original. I am not one to dismiss sequels, and many of them I like. It is true that few sequels ever compare to the greatness of the first. For that reason you have to look at them as separately as you possibly can, especially watching them for the first time. Inferno is one movie where I must boldly say that I like it almost as much as the first one.

I'd also go a step further and say that to me, visually, I feel this sequel is truer to The Hellbound Heart than the original movie. That's a funny thing to say given that Clive Barker was the scriptwriter and director on the first film. Still I stand by it, and as I specified I mean visually. Inferno has the truest of the Cenobites in it. It also has The Engineer in a much more specific form than that creature that some claim was him in the original. As for the rest of Inferno? Well I couldn't shake the feeling by the end of it that it is maybe one of the most disturbing movies I've seen. It has the excellent mix of seen and unseen, lets you imagine your worst and then shows you the special effects' team's worst, which is their best. So what are you waiting for? If you don't have a copy of this to watch tonight get on it.

Mood: excited.
Music: Haunted by Poe.

13 Nights of Halloween: Night #3: Event Horizon

Tonight's movie is a blend of science fiction and horror called "Event
Horizon". The first thing I can do to describe this movie is to call it something that others have called it with a bit of contempt. I consider it a selling point and I also consider it a complement when I call it "Hellraiser in Space", though of course we had for the real in the third of the Hellraiser series. The general idea is not a totally uncommon one though I love the approach that Event Horizon took. As far as the sci-fi bits go I've heard that this movie has one of the most realistic representations of a live human unprotected in space. Though perhaps that realism was based on knowledge at the time the film was made and has been become less correct since.

There is a new DVD edition of Event Horizon out since I bought my copy some years ago. The new one is in the Amazon.ca link up above (the image). The edition I have took a little bit of tweaking to maximise the film's use of surround sound. The movie has great surround once your levels are good. I love hearing the storm raging outside of the ship and how it comes from different speakers when they are in different parts of the ship--it's in an atmosphere. Another thing I love about this movie is Sam Neill's part and they way he plays the role. This is also one of those movies that has an absolutely glorious horrific set piece in it--the ship--in particular the drive room. That set was made for horror.

Mood: light.
Music: Haunted by Type O Negative.