Editorials
Looking Back on the ‘Hellraiser’ Franchise’s Love Affair With Film Noir
I recently came across a Tweet (or is it a Xeet?) comparing Maggie Gyllenhaal’s controversial The Bride! to the direct-to-video Hellraiser sequels because of the recent film’s inclusion of a bizarre detective plotline that some audiences considered unnecessary. However, while most folks interpreted this comparison as a jab towards Gyllenhaal’s sophomore feature, it was precisely that snarky post which convinced me to go out and watch the movie for myself, as I’m part of the small group of fans that actually enjoy the investigative thrills of the less popular Hellraiser movies.
In fact, I’d argue that, if you’re trying to add a new spin to the Hellraiser mythos after the original duology, focusing on the mental unraveling of a desensitized Humphrey Bogart type who thinks he’s seen everything is one of your best options. So, in honor of Hellraiser: Revival returning the cenobites to their enigmatic roots, today I’d like to invite my fellow horror fans to follow me down a rabbit hole of sex, violence, and gruesome mysteries as we explore the origins of the Hellraiser franchise’s love affair with Film Noir – and why this trend might be worth revisiting in the future.
Of course, in order to properly understand how Noir storytelling complements Clive Barker’s hellscapes, we first have to understand where the genre came from. While it can be argued that the elements of crime fiction which we now associate with Noir have their roots in 19th-century true crime and even in horror stories such as Edgar Allan Poe’s The Murders in the Rue Morgue, Film Noir would only grace the silver screen after the outbreak of World War II.
Not only did the war force an array of German filmmakers to emigrate to the West (bringing with them years of experience with the shadowy visuals and disturbing subject matter that defined German Expressionism), but this undeniably dark period in human history had also left audiences more willing to engage with uncomfortable narratives.
Doug Bradley in Hellbound: Hellraiser II
That’s why the 1940s saw an explosion of detective stories about morally dubious investigators, sadistic criminals, and dangerous Femmes Fatales – with this last trope likely being a cultural reaction to how the war had forced American women to take on traditionally masculine roles.
Barker himself has repeatedly affirmed his love for this darker style of detective fiction, with the author going so far as to create the paranormal investigator Harry D’Amour as his supernatural answer to iconic figures like Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe. It’s also quite obvious that Barker sees the rabbit-hole-like progression of classic detective fiction as an equally effective framework for horror stories. In fact, once you start to look for these investigative patterns in his work, you’ll start to see them everywhere.
Back during the production of Ryuhei Kitamura’s highly underrated adaptation of The Midnight Meat Train, Barker produced a series of fascinating behind-the-scenes vignettes where he commented on his storytelling process regarding the Books of Blood. In one of these videos, the author uses the visual motif of a spiral to explain how he develops his protagonists’ inescapable journey towards a dark truth about the world around them, with each new piece of information pulling them further downwards as they (often quite literally) spiral into insanity.
Hellraiser: Hellseeker
Not only is this the very same formula that Barker used in The Hellbound Heart, with Frank and Julia’s bizarre partnership also feeling a lot like something out of a pulpy crime thriller, but the idea that our lead character ends up disillusioned and mentally scarred after learning too much is a recurring motif in many classic Noir stories.
While this is only a superficial similarity, some of the most iconic Noir narratives happen to involve the detective attempting to retrieve a memorable MacGuffin of some kind – and what better artefact to ground your mystery narrative than the elusive Lament Configuration? Much like the Maltese Falcon, this enigmatic little puzzle box led many men to death and corruption, though the obsession it causes in its victims is more overtly supernatural than what you usually see in detective fiction.
Unfortunately, there’s a huge difference between a film having a good premise and actually being a good time, and that’s why even I have to admit that sequels like Hellraiser: Hellseeker (a supernatural mystery where Kirsty Cotton’s husband is haunted by her disappearance) and Hellraiser: Deader (a Saw-inspired investigative thriller where a reporter tracks down a death cult) don’t quite make the most of their Noir influences. I may enjoy these movies, but the lack of narrative focus isn’t all that surprising when you consider that many of these sequel scripts were actually unrelated horror stories that Dimension Films hastily re-worked into Hellraiser follow-ups in order to maintain the rights to the franchise, with few writers getting the chance to actually explore the line connecting Humphrey Bogart to Doug Bradley.
Hellraiser: Inferno
I’d argue that Scott Derrickson’s Hellraiser: Inferno is the only sequel that came close to acknowledging these connections, and even that underrated film suffers from a messy narrative. Hell, Barker himself tried and arguably failed to explore this inter-genre love affair in The Scarlet Gospels, his divisive sequel to both The Hellbound Heart and the Harry D’Amour stories – with the end result not really satisfying fans of either series.
Yet, I still think that a disturbing detective story where an obsessed protagonist attempts to piece together a missing persons case involving cenobites has the potential to bring the series back to its pulpy roots. Of course, this would only be possible if said story was actually developed as a Hellraiser yarn from the very start.
Naturally, neo-noir storytelling is just one possible direction that the Hellraiser franchise can take now that the series is back in the hands of the man who created it. However, no matter where Pinhead and company are headed next, I think it’s important for writers to remember the underlying threads of crime, sex, and corruption that originally informed Barker’s nightmarish work.
Hellraiser
Judging from the unprecedented box office success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms adaptation, you’ve likely already seen the liminal horror hit that managed to make audiences afraid of empty hallways and bad wallpaper. And now that so many of us have already entered the yellow labyrinth (some of us more than once), the time has come to discuss the spoiler-filled details that make the movie so fascinating in the first place.
And if there’s one element here that makes the Backrooms movie stand out from any previous lore/mythology, it has to be the genius addition of the Still Life entities. Warped recreations of real people that somehow wandered into the Complex, these misremembered creatures are responsible for some of the most disturbing imagery of 2026 – as well as laugh-out-loud memes created by one of the film’s very own concept artists.
However, true to Parsons’ word that the movie would rely heavily on practical effects, each of these distorted monsters was brought to life by real actors under heavy layers of makeup and prosthetics (with the occasional splash of CGI enhancements). While Anora and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You actress Ivy Wolk wasn’t among these performers, despite what Letterboxd might have you believe, the creature cast did benefit from veteran players with plenty of genre experience.
For starters, Alien: Romulus alumni Robert Bobroczkyi (who previously brought that film’s horrific Offspring to life during its most memorable sequence) plays the flick’s main antagonist, the Still Life version of Captain Clark. And though there was some obvious CGI involved in making the character’s peg-leg and nightmarish face more believable, Bobroczkyi’s monstrous performance and his natural 7’7″ frame helped to make that final chase sequence a clear highlight among this year’s genre offerings.
The film’s Texas-Chain-Saw-inspired “dinner” scene also features a freaky collection of less-aggressive Still Life creatures in the form of the Bearded Man, the Red-Headed Woman and, strangest of them all, the cheekily named “Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life” (who earned this title among fans and crewmembers as a reference to his apparent affinity for lamps).
While this was the first major horror outing for both Patrick Baynham (The Bearded Man) and Dana Mahmood (Archibald), Rhiannon Roberts has worked as a stunt performer in everything from Yellowjackets to HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation – which is probably why The Red-Headed Woman is the most active out of Clark’s impromptu “family.” That being said, the Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life is my personal favorite of the bunch simply because his anachronistic outfit suggests that the Backrooms phenomenon might be a lot older than the Async Foundation. I also love how hard he tries to be helpful with that little light of his!
That might be it for the Still Life entities, but I think horror fans will also be pleased to hear that the film’s Found Footage prologue stars none other than Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City star Avan Jogia as Naren Warne – and American Mary herself Katharine Isabelle also shows up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo at Mary’s house party towards the middle of the story (though I have a feeling that she originally had a bigger part that was likely cut for time).
At the end of the day, Parsons’ Backrooms may have been an auteur-driven project motivated by the young director’s unique take on the classic creepypasta, but film has always been a collective artform, so it’s fun to see just how many talented performers it takes to bring this kind of supernatural nightmare to life in a way that connects with so many people.
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