Two kids decide to leave their life of luxury behind and take a trip to Tijuana. One of them films everything with a camera. They pick up a girl at a bar, but the alpha guy steals her from his friend and has sex with her in the bathroom. The other guy walks in on them. Next morning they wake up in the bathroom (?) not remembering much but find the girl in a stall with her head smashed in. After some drama they go to another bar where some bum appears and offers them all sorts of experiences--he hands alpha guy the lament configuration box.
Some of this is told backwards and in pieces. The two rich 1%er families of these kids have a fancy dinner. Also there, the sister of beta guy who was alpha's girlfriend. They have the bag of beta guy and in there is the camera and the mother watches and re-watches what happens to them after they open the puzzle box.
What happened was that Pinhead of course shows up, chains alpha, there's another Pinhead-in-the-making and some other cenobites. All this is explained later when surprisingly the beta kid arrives at home much to the delight of the family. He's in shock and announces that they are coming. When he wakes up, he's actually not quite himself and eventually flips out. The bum also appears similarly announcing bad news for all. Eventually all hell breaks loose and we find out exactly what happened in Mexico.
If you read in the trivia section how this movie came about, how production was rushed and took only a few weeks; how it was written by a guy who does make-up, and directed by someone with little experience, the surprise is that Hellraiser: Revelations isn't even worse. The score on IMDb is a bit unfair to the resulting product. Revelations isn't any worse than the awful 4 movies that preceded it. How can the terrible Inferno have double the score of Revelations? But it is fair score as a punishment to those behind this cynical and moronic project, the sole goal of which was to allow Dimension to keep profiting from the first movie. The unwillingness to hire Doug Bradley to play Pinhead is the catastrophic flaw of this movie. Because his replacement is a disaster. And the guy they hired to do his voice is even worse. And without a strong Pinhead you can't have a strong Hellraiser.
The script in general isn't too bad. It has some good ideas...and some bad ones. Especially bad is the idea to have another little Pinhead. But worse is that the script doesn't have are any good lines for Pinhead. None.
The movie features some POV camera work, not a whole lot. It does actually a good job of integrating POV with third person. The cast does a solid job I must say, even though I'm not crazy about the casting of the two kids. The lovely Tracey Fairaway is a revelation as well as the attractive first Mexican girl (Adel Marie Ruiz?). There isn't a whole lot of gore or horror as the movie is more interested in family drama.
I'm giving the movie itself a 6. As a Hellraiser movie without Doug Bradley though, a 3 is indeed appropriate. Perhaps one day someone will pick up this franchise who will finally give Hellraiser fans something to be excited about. Instead of struggling to remake the first one, Hollywood should just give us a decent sequel. It shouldn't be that hard even for lalaland geniuses.
Some of this is told backwards and in pieces. The two rich 1%er families of these kids have a fancy dinner. Also there, the sister of beta guy who was alpha's girlfriend. They have the bag of beta guy and in there is the camera and the mother watches and re-watches what happens to them after they open the puzzle box.
What happened was that Pinhead of course shows up, chains alpha, there's another Pinhead-in-the-making and some other cenobites. All this is explained later when surprisingly the beta kid arrives at home much to the delight of the family. He's in shock and announces that they are coming. When he wakes up, he's actually not quite himself and eventually flips out. The bum also appears similarly announcing bad news for all. Eventually all hell breaks loose and we find out exactly what happened in Mexico.
If you read in the trivia section how this movie came about, how production was rushed and took only a few weeks; how it was written by a guy who does make-up, and directed by someone with little experience, the surprise is that Hellraiser: Revelations isn't even worse. The score on IMDb is a bit unfair to the resulting product. Revelations isn't any worse than the awful 4 movies that preceded it. How can the terrible Inferno have double the score of Revelations? But it is fair score as a punishment to those behind this cynical and moronic project, the sole goal of which was to allow Dimension to keep profiting from the first movie. The unwillingness to hire Doug Bradley to play Pinhead is the catastrophic flaw of this movie. Because his replacement is a disaster. And the guy they hired to do his voice is even worse. And without a strong Pinhead you can't have a strong Hellraiser.
The script in general isn't too bad. It has some good ideas...and some bad ones. Especially bad is the idea to have another little Pinhead. But worse is that the script doesn't have are any good lines for Pinhead. None.
The movie features some POV camera work, not a whole lot. It does actually a good job of integrating POV with third person. The cast does a solid job I must say, even though I'm not crazy about the casting of the two kids. The lovely Tracey Fairaway is a revelation as well as the attractive first Mexican girl (Adel Marie Ruiz?). There isn't a whole lot of gore or horror as the movie is more interested in family drama.
I'm giving the movie itself a 6. As a Hellraiser movie without Doug Bradley though, a 3 is indeed appropriate. Perhaps one day someone will pick up this franchise who will finally give Hellraiser fans something to be excited about. Instead of struggling to remake the first one, Hollywood should just give us a decent sequel. It shouldn't be that hard even for lalaland geniuses.