Macabre…ish Horror Review: Hellraiser: Bloodline

by Kimberly Walker August 09, 2022

Hellraiser: Bloodline, 1996/ 85 min.

aka Hellraiser IV (4)

A celebrated toymaker, Le Marchand (Bruce Ramsay), is commissioned to make his greatest creation, the Lament Configuration, unbeknownst to him, it will be a portal to hell. This was in the 18th century.

In the future, 2127, Dr. Paul Merchant (Bruce Ramsay), an engineer, locks himself inside a room in a space station of his design and uses a robot to solve the Lament Configuration. When the puzzle is solved it destroys the robot.

Security arrives too late and breaks in, Dr. Merchant explains to his boss, what he was doing in there. And what the box is. That it was a commission for a libertine aristocrat and the specification of the build made it a portal to hell.

Flashback 18th century

Upon delivery of the puzzle box to L’Isle’s (Mickey Cottrell) mansion, he and his guests open the box, summons a demon and offers a newly murdered peasant girl as sacrifice, her flayed skin, removed by L’Isle and his assistant, for the ritual.

Horrified, Le Marchand runs home and sets to making a second box, in hopes of counteracting the first. He returns to recover the first box and realizes the assistant, Jacques (Adam Scott) has killed L’Isle and taken control of Angelique (Valentina Vargas) who agrees to be his slave.

Le Marchand does not survive the puzzle boxes recovery and before he dies he is informed that his generations are now cursed for his part in opening the portal.

In 1996 Manhattan

John Merchant (Bruce Ramsay), a descendant of Le Marchand, has built a sky scraper that is an enormous Lament Configuration.

In 1996 Paris

Angelique and Jacque still live and she sees John and his creation in a magazine, she wants to go to New York because John poses a threat to hell. When Jacques informs her she isn’t going, she reminds him of the monster she is and kills him.

Upon arriving in Manhattan, Angelique will summon Pinhead (Doug Bradley) via a building guard and use him as an offering. The two demonic beings clash because each has different ideologies concerning Hell. But they have to come together to stop Merchant from building the Elysium Configuration which is in opposition to the Lament Configuration and could seal all gateways to Hell forever.

In 2127

Rimmer (Christine Harnos) does not believe Dr. Merchant’s story and his him imprisoned but because the Lament Configuration has already been opened, the Cenobites and other beings of Hell, are already there. And the final showdown has already begun and so has the plan to seal the gateway to Hell.

This Hellraiser movie is directed by Kevin Yagher aka Alan Smithee and Joe Chapelle and written by

Peter Atkins. This is both a prequel and sequel and has much more depth of story spanning generations but it gets right to the point, this movie is almost zero filler and goes by fast.

The cast seems much bigger than it is with one man playing every generation of one family with the exception of Jack (Courtland Meade). The monster effects are very good for it’s time and the CG is 90s CG. There is torture and it is gory and bloody but it insinuates more than it actually shows. There are flashbacks and flash forwards so you have to pay attention or be lost. Expect graphic and adult scenes. I really enjoyed this one!

Note: Twin security guards are turned into ‘Siamese Twin’ Cenobites and hell hounds in this one.