KnotStronger This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.

Humbersi The first must-see film of the year.

Roxie The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

Geraldine The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Zbigniew_Krycsiwiki Mere hours after the events in the original, adorable Kirsty ( Ashley Laurence ) quite literally goes to Hell, attempting to bring her father back, with an puzzle solver in tow, who might know how to close the Lament Configuration once and for all. It is most unfortunate, however, the young puzzle solver ( Imogene Boorman ) is so awful in her role that it becomes distracting, not to mention that I spent most of her scenes wondering if the role was being played by a real girl, or an androgynous guy?Pinhead and his Cenobites are still gruesome and ghoulish, simultaneously frightening, and also what keeps most watching, but the depiction of Hell is only a mixed bag. Hell is shown here as a labyrinthine series of concrete hallways, dusty, seemingly endless, like we're just wandering through a castle. Some shots of it are convincing, and look good, while in other scenes, it's clearly just painted backdrops.Claire Higgins, as Julia, is an evil creature, cold and ruthless. It's interesting to wonder how the series would have progressed if she had agreed to return for more sequels.

simonconnolly72-467-863881 The saying "less is more" couldn't be more fittingly applied than to this sequel. Whereas the first movie was a simpler told story, though still with it's problems, this one is an all out gorefest, full of badly connected scenes with no coherency of plot. As mentioned in the title, it's an overblown incoherent mess that throws everything it can at you and in turn negates any effect or atmosphere it could have created. It's amazing how many people will rate things a 10 out of 10. I know we all have different tastes, but it seems that logic, clear plot and characters takes a back seat to other lesser things which though not unimportant, are the added extras which should be the finishing touches to the film. There are many film makers out there, but very few skilled storytellers.

thelastblogontheleft Clive Barker wrote the story but he didn't direct this one as he did the first — Tony Randel stepped in after editing the original, and Barker took the role of executive producer. From what I've read they got a little sloppy as far as using some stills from scenes that wound up being cut in their promos, and changing up the Chatterer cenobite (giving him eyes) to the chagrin of die-hard Hellraiser fans. I was also interested to read that Randel and the rest of the crew fully expected Julia to step in and sort of take over Pinhead's role as the pillar of the remaining movies, but when she declined to take part in any further sequels (and when they saw how massive of a hit Pinhead was in the first film), they kept him as the main villain.The sequel begins mere hours after the ending of the first — Kirsty is in a psychiatric hospital, still having visions of all the horrors she experienced. She meets Dr. Channard (the appropriately evil Kenneth Cranham) and his assistant Kyle (William Hope), and urges them to destroy the mattress that Julia had died on. It is soon revealed that Dr. Channard — a wicked man who is comfortable using others for his own sick experiments — is well aware of the power of that mattress and the Lament Configuration itself and he's eager to do his own research. He brings one of his psychiatric patients to his home and offers the manic, restlessly itching man a razorblade so his blood can resurrect Julia. Kyle has witnessed the whole thing after he became suspicious of Channard, but he is quickly sacrificed to complete Julia's physical form after him and Kirsty return together. It's then up to Kirsty and her new- found friend, Tiffany (Imogen Boorman) — a mute patient of Dr. Channard's who is particularly adept at puzzles — to defeat both Channard and Julia and escape the cenobites.I am a bit torn on how I feel about them showing the sort of "background" of Pinhead — also known as Captain Elliot Spencer — becoming what he is now. Part of his mystique, his larger than life personality, was not really knowing where he came from or how he found himself as the leader of these hellish demons. So to see him in the opening of the movie as just this nerdy looking guy was… off putting. I think it adds to the sadness of the whole concept, which they explore more later on — the fact that all of these cenobites were once human — but it does put a dent in his horrifying armor.The scene where Dr. Channard has the psychiatric patient flaying himself open with a razor is… more intense than I even remembered. It's just one of those scenes where you just stare open-mouthed in disbelief. And Channard's mix of disgust and morbid fascination is perfect.The bloody, muscley suit they have Julia in is BRILLIANT. The special effects team did an incredible job, truly. It's so glistening and REAL looking (I mean, I don't actually know what a person without skin would look like, but if I had to guess, that would be it.)The scene when the cenobites show up is, true to form, FANTASTIC. I just love the whole process — the wind starts gusting in, thunder starts booming, lightning flashes, glass shatters, and right when you think the chaos has settled… the room literally just OPENS UP, stretching out old cobwebs and revealing this otherworldly glow. And then out they come, each more horrifying than the last, until we get to Pinhead himself who is just THE MOST EPIC VILLAIN EVER I AM NEVER OVER IT.They clearly set up Julia to be the new #1, even having her repeat some of Pinhead's classic lines like "Come, I have such sights to show you" as she escorts Dr. Channard around. She would have been a worthy rival, really.The maze that they are existing in is pretty awesome, partially for its sheer expansiveness… they show it from above in one scene and it's just overwhelmingly massive. The star of the show is Leviathan, the ruling deity over the cenobites' home world — a monstrous, hovering octahedron that emits a horn-like noise that will haunt your dreams (composer Christopher Young even included the morse code for "God" in the sound) and an intense black beam that will force you to re-live past memories. Impressive, to say the least. I loved Channard being overwhelmed by its sheer enormity and uttering "Oh, God" and Julia responding with "no, this is mine".Dr. Channard being transformed into a cenobite himself is… amazing, and his re- emergence — "And to think… I hesitated" — is PERFECT. Chills. He has the creepiest laugh ever and he's sort of this maniacal, almost mischievous creature. He's straight up amused by the power he wields and completely uninhibited thanks to his utter lack of caring (not that he was ever held back by such a thing). What the other cenobites lack in enthusiasm he makes up for, without a doubt.And then comes one of the most disappointing scenes in all of my movie watching: Channard killing all of the cenobites, finishing with slashing Pinhead's throat. Again… Pinhead is this omnipotent being, and he's not only reduced back to his human form but then killed off by this newbie cenobite's (admittedly awesome but stupid in this context) snake knives? COME ON NOW. Heartbreaking, honestly. But it's okay because Channard's head gets ripped in half not long after that and it's sweet, sweet revenge.Ultimately, I felt like it wasn't nearly as cohesive as the first film, but offered enough of the familiar awesomeness to be a worthwhile watch.

trashgang One year after the release of Hellraiser a sequel was made and started immediately with a summery of the original one. The tone was set, welcome to hell. Be aware to see the full uncut clocking in at 1 hour 39 minutes. A lot of versions are 4 minutes shorter some even clock in at 78 minutes!The story continues after what happened in part one, Kirsty's family is dead and she's in some kind of asylum. Sadly for her, the head of the institution, Dr Channard, is an occultist and resurrect the cenobites.If you haven't seen part one, there's enough of samples shown to understand it all. We also see how pinhead was created and who he was in real life. On part of the effects, just wait an 26 minutes into the flick and the gore comes already in. But once Channard is falling in love with Julia things go wrong and hell breaks lose but things also go wrong with this flick. The cenobites are destroyed as is pinhead and let that be the strength of part 1. Without pinhead you don't have a hellraiser flick. He's in it but not that much it's all about Dr. Channard and Jennifer, a child which can solve puzzles. So she will open hell.What annoyed me was also the fact that the effects used are outdated right now. The gore is in tact but the other effects are not, some are done in stop/motion and that's not exactly what we want to see even back in 1988. Still above mediocre but worse was yet to come as we all knew.Gore 2/5 Nudity 0,5/5 Effects 2,5/5 Story 2,5/5 Comedy 0/5