Clive Barker hated the film. While he wrote the screenplay and it is mostly faithful to the original story, he was very unhappy with some of the acting and especially with Rawhead Rex's ogre-like design, as he intended the monster to look like a giant phallus. This dissatisfaction inspired him to take a more central role when making Hellraiser.
In Clive Barker's original story, Rawhead Rex was a 9-foot tall demon with a face like raw meat, hence the name Rawhead
This movie was shot during a freezing cold winter. Streets and forests had to be hosed down in order to remove snow before certain scenes were shot for the sake of continuity.
The special effects team only had four weeks to make the Rawhead Rex costume, and it was done as a single piece with latex skin.
According to director George Pavlou on the Kino Lorber DVD commentary, a brief scene which showed a woman wearing a red coat was meant to be an homage to Don't Look Now.