Review of Hellraiser: Deader (2005) by Robert M — 30 Jun 2010

Drat, drat and double drat! They were doing so good! I mean "Hellseeker" faltered a bit but now the "Hellraiser" franchise is slowly circling the drain again with "Deader". Not that this seventh entry is all bad, but the execution of the film is stale and can't keep the concept afloat. More on that in a minute. First, lets strike up a synopsis.

Amy Klein is your self destructive journalist on a mission. One that gets the scoop on all the dirty shit whilst submitting herself to it all. That's why she was let go from the New York Post. That's why she is working at London Underground. That's why she is sent to Bucharest to investigate a group of suicide cultists that seem to come back to life by the power of their charismatic leader. Turns out she is some sort of 'chosen one' after she finds out that their leader, Winter, has connections to some mysterious box that he is creating an army to battle against. Looks like Amy might raise a little Hell in Bucharest.

Now the reason why "Deader" fails more often than not is because, quite frankly, it rarely makes sense. The concept of a group of people lead by a descendant of the toy maker looking to beat death using the puzzle box is quite intriguing. In fact, there are even moments in the movie that I thoroughly enjoyed (the desperation and panic of the knife in the back bathroom sequence for example). What happens though, is that "Deader" tends to lose focus and make weird leaps in logic that seemingly makes it forget what its actually doing. Thusly giving it a disjointed and somewhat head scratchingly odd flow where everything seems to be a dream or bullshit. Our lead actress follows this same pattern giving us a moment or two before losing herself in a story that never quite makes any sense. Let's throw a hooded man that's going to knife her here! Does it make sense? Absolutely not. But its a DREAM! Cough - cop out - cough. Let's get real shall we?

The movie does have some moments. Like I said, the concept is actually some what intriguing and the acting can be good but the film is just too random and off center to actually be able to make anything cohesive. Everything is just too hit or miss in this film and it suffers so much from its lack of continuity. If you enjoyed "Inferno" or "Hellseeker" like I did than you probably should stop there on the high note. Cause "Deader" just doesn't make the cut. Tries to be smart but ends up just confused.

BONUS RANT: There are so many things I wanted to say in this section - details that made me go 'wtf?!', but I have to say the biggest one is our underground know it all character Joey. Joey is the most random fucking thing in this movie. He seems to know everything and warn Amy about staying away from the Deaders, yet lives ON A FUCKING SUBWAY TRAIN full of sex and debauchery where no one seems to question why. How is this even possible?! Then to top it off, he shows up at the very end during the big conflict and randomly dies and spouts off a one liner. WHAT?! WHAT?! Where the hell did you come from? Why? Who? Dammit this movie makes my head hurt!