This installment of the Hellraiser series is - along with the 5th - one of the worse yet. The writing is a shambles, the direction is all over the place and the acting is extremely wooden. This isn't even close to the Hellraiser universe (apart from about 10 minutes within the end act) and it's like a separate movie that just uses the Hellraiser name.
Almost right from the start it's a constant series of flashbacks, hallucinations, hallucinations within hallucinations, dreams within hallucinations. The only time it feels like a coherent story line is in the last 15 minutes. Before that, you have to suffer through a total mish mash of what's real and what's not real. All IS revealed in that last 15 minutes, but boy, it's a bit of an excruciating journey getting there.
When you see Kirsty at the start of the movie, you may think that you're in for an interesting take on what happened to her since she escaped Pinhead years prior, but nope. Instead we're treated to Trevor (Kirsty's husband played by Dean Winters) just ambling along aimlessly for 3/4 of the movie, going from dream sequence to hallucination and back again. There's no real depth to any of the other characters either. I know the main focus here is on Trevor, but everyone else just seemed to play a bit part, including Pinhead. The first 3 films revolved around Pinhead and his fellow Cenobites in one way or another. Here, they're just like extras that turn up for a few odd minutes here and there.
This truely is a dire installment to the franchise and if this is the extent of Dean Winters' film career, he should just stick ti the Allstate adverts.
Almost right from the start it's a constant series of flashbacks, hallucinations, hallucinations within hallucinations, dreams within hallucinations. The only time it feels like a coherent story line is in the last 15 minutes. Before that, you have to suffer through a total mish mash of what's real and what's not real. All IS revealed in that last 15 minutes, but boy, it's a bit of an excruciating journey getting there.
When you see Kirsty at the start of the movie, you may think that you're in for an interesting take on what happened to her since she escaped Pinhead years prior, but nope. Instead we're treated to Trevor (Kirsty's husband played by Dean Winters) just ambling along aimlessly for 3/4 of the movie, going from dream sequence to hallucination and back again. There's no real depth to any of the other characters either. I know the main focus here is on Trevor, but everyone else just seemed to play a bit part, including Pinhead. The first 3 films revolved around Pinhead and his fellow Cenobites in one way or another. Here, they're just like extras that turn up for a few odd minutes here and there.
This truely is a dire installment to the franchise and if this is the extent of Dean Winters' film career, he should just stick ti the Allstate adverts.