Eleventh Annual FMS Scarelicious October Movie Series: #6 Hellbound: Hellraiser II

 I watched the first Hellraiser movie way back in June of 2009.  I hadn't really gotten into watching horror movies at that point and I didn't really know what to say about it.  I liked it?  I thought it was really something.  Let's just say that 1988's Hellbound: Hellraiser II is even more ... something.

In case any viewers had forgotten what transpired in the first flick (like, ahem, me), this sequel shows a lot of flashbacks/scenes from the original and features much of the same cast.  The storyline - like the first one - is both meager and confusing as the Hellraiser movies seem to be much more concerned about presenting striking images than a coherent plot.  Like the first movie, Hellraiser II is very, very gory, full of nasty body horror.  It's pretty amazing.

The sequel appears to be about: Kirsty, the first film's Final Girl, is in a psychiatric hospital, seeming momentarily after the events of the first film, despite having much better hair.  Unfortunately, the doctor she is assigned to is obsessed with Hell and the puzzle boxes and once he manages to obtain the bloody mattress on which evil stepmother Julia died (first movie), he is able to (1) resurrect a flayed Julia, and bring her lots of crazy patient victims from whom she can take their skin and (2) get another patient, mute Tiffany, to solve one of the puzzle boxes to raise Hell.  Julia shows Hell to the doctor and some obelisk-y evil sticks a giant hose into his head, turning him into a monster.  Meanwhile, the Cenobites FINALLY show up as Kirsty and Tiffany run around Hell, trying to find Kirsty's poor father.  In a very strange twist, the doctor-monster KILLS THE CENOBITES, which turns them back into the humans they'd forgotten they were.  But the two Final Girls put the puzzle back together, killing Julia and the doctor-monster and escaping back to the real world.

Now, the above synopsis is rather more coherent than the movie actually is - there is a lot of running around and jumping from scene to scene, from flayed body to flayed body, bouncing around with very little sense of time, space or sense.  If you like your movies to have understandable storylines, this is not that movie.  But if you're in it for nightmarish scenes and disgusting, old fashioned practical effects, go for it.  But seriously - the Cenobites become sort-of good guys and then get killed off?  That seems all kinds of wrong.  They are incredible monster designs, truly unforgettable, and in each of these Hellraiser movies I find myself wishing they had more screen time.  Even if they don't do much to advance the plot.