Hellraiser (PSP UMD)
 Stephen Mercado  rates it:    Community rates it: (no ratings yet)
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Hellraiser (PSP UMD)
Director: Clive Baker
Screenplay: Clive Baker
Originally Released: 1987

I’ll admit Hellraiser surprised me. Before watching Hellraiser, I was sure it was going to be some crappy horror-slasher genre flick, like most of it’s kind from the late 80’s, early 90’s. I was expecting a cliché story, with a good amount of gore. What I got instead was very, very different.

Hellraiser starts the first half of the movie keeping the audience guessing, keeping most of its story shrouded in mystery. We start off with some guy buying some cube, then we show him back at his home (apparently) where he’s surrounded by candles. He then manipulates the cube and from there, things get gory.

The film is quickly paced, characters and plot are set up almost from the get go, and Baker does an excellent job of keeping the film rolling. The actors are decent enough, though they didn’t give Emmy award giving performances, but that’s forgivable given that this is horror flick, back when they were often looked down upon.

Where the film falls apart is more towards the end. After the plot is revealed and everything’s out in the open, things get non-sensible. The last quarter of the movie is a bunch of rubbish mixed in with buckets of gore, however even at the end the gore and FX look weak and somewhat rushed. In fact, the whole ending seems to have come about because the director was running out of both time and money.
Score: 3½/5

UMD Extras (NOTE: The following was just lifted out of my children of the corn review, while the movies are completely different, nothing’s changed as far as the extras are concerned):
This is where Anchor bay drops the ball completely. For this UMD release, much like all Anchor Bay UMD releases, there are absolutely no extras, no features, no audio options, not even a chapter selection! There’s a menu, but it’s basically useless since all you can do is simply hit the “PLAY” button to start the movie. I’ll give the menu a half can, seeing how it’s technically a feature.
Score: ½/5 cans

Overall: While Hellraiser isn’t perfect film by any means, it’s still an interesting horror film, even to this day.

Final Score: 2½/5

Added:  Monday, December 19, 2005

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