Movies
Barker Update on ‘Hellraiser’ Remake, Tunnicliffe Pinhead Design Reaction
Bloody-Disgusting spoke exclusively with horror icon Clive Barker yesterday for the first part of an extensive and very frank interview on a number of topics, from The Midnight Meat Train release fiasco and the new DVD/Blu-ray (which Barker admits he is pleased with) to the many upcoming projects he has going, from short fiction to novels and film projects. Read on for the skinny and an update on the Hellraiser reboot.
On the highly-anticipated remake of Hellraiser by director Pascal Laugier, Barker says he is in regular contact with the director and will soon be reading Laugier’s treatment. “I’m supposed to get his treatment this week,” Barker tells BD. “After which, I think I’m meeting him here in Los Angeles and then I guess he’s going to go in and write the screenplay. I liked Martyrs a lot. I’m very excited at the idea of him doing it.”
Barker is happy to pass the reigns of the franchise over to the capable hands of Laugier and says he feels confident that the Martyrs director will do the Cenobites proud. “The first version will always be there,” says Barker. “Pascal is a very talented filmmaker, obviously a lot more talented than I was when I stepped onto the sound stage on [the first] Hellraiser and I hadn’t really directed anything before… I am completely open and ready to be blown away. I don’t have any possessiveness about it. I just want people to have fun.”
As to Barker’s involvement in the production, he admits that will depend on the location. “I assume if it’s shot in Los Angeles, I won’t be able to stay away. But if it’s shot in Europe or [elsewhere], I haven’t been told about any of that, so we’ll see what happens.”
The Hellraiser remake recently got some unintentional focus when makeup designer (and Hellraiser franchise vet) Gary J. Tunnicliffe created a new design for Pinhead on spec, hoping to land the job on the remake. The designs weren’t popular with fans, nor with Barker. “I didn’t like them,” Barker admits. “I thought they were provocative in the sense of hopefully making people take notice of what worked and what didn’t work. I feel that the Pinhead design works best because it’s geometric. It’s very severe and schematized. Each of the squares are the same size, all the scars are laid out in a straight line. It isn’t the work of somebody going at somebody else’s face with a chainsaw. That, I think, is what makes the thing scary – ritual scarification. This is not crude, vicious slashing.
“I think the combination of a very organized system of scarring with a nail at every intersection is almost mathematical in its precision. The fact that that’s been done to somebody or worse, that they’ve done to themselves, is what makes that image powerful. Once you take away the squares all being the same size and the nails all being the same length, you are just left with a slasher victim, which I don’t think Pinhead is. I think Pinhead is a priest at the alter of a S & M.”
We’ll have more next week from our series of interviews with Barker including updates on Dread, Tortured Souls, Down Satan and The Midnight Meat Train trilogy plans.
The holiday weekend means a light week for new horror releases, but it does bring the return of Dark Castle Entertainment to select theaters. It’s being joined by 6 new horror movies.
Here’s all the new horror releasing June 29, 2026 – July 3, 2026!
For daily reminders about new horror releases, be sure to follow @HorrorCalendar.
You wished for it. The highest-grossing horror movie of the year (so far), Curry Barker’s Obsession, arrived on Digital on June 30.
In Curry Barker’s theatrical debut Obsession, after breaking the mysterious One Wish Willow to win his crush’s heart, a hopeless romantic finds himself getting exactly what he asked for but soon discovers that some desires come at a dark, sinister price.
Michael Johnston (“Teen Wolf”), Inde Navarette (“Superman & Lois”), Cooper Tomlinson (“That’s a Bad Idea,” Milk & Serial), Megan Lawless (The Death That Awaits), and Emmy Award-nominee Andy Richter (“Conan,” Elf) star.
Based on a story by director James Kondelik (Behind The Walls) and a screenplay by Canadian writer Victor Rose, survival thriller Pitfall headed home to Digital on June 30. Family is murder in this Cineverse release.
In Pitfall, a young man becomes separated from his friends in the woods and plunges into a ten-foot pit lined with spikes, impaling his leg and leaving him helpless. As reality sinks in and his situation grows dire, he realizes the fall wasn’t an accident.
The film stars Richard Harmon (Final Destination: Bloodlines), Alexandra Essoe (The Pope’s Exorcist), and UFC champion Randy Couture (The Expendables) as the ruthless killer who stalks his prey in the woods. Marshall Williams (The Ice Road), Jordan Claire Robbins (The Umbrella Academy), and Matt Hamilton (Murder for Sale) also star.
The Amityville IP leans into Jaws with Amityville Shark House, just in time for the Fourth of July holiday too, as it released on Digital June 30.
Will Collazo Jr. (Amityville Thanksgiving) and Shawn C. Phillips (Amityville Karen) co-direct from a script they wrote with Julie Anne Prescott.
In the movie, after discovering an ominous shark idol hidden beneath the decaying floorboards, Richard unknowingly awakens an ancient and savage force. As the entity begins to merge with him, a quiet coastal town descends into blood-soaked chaos.
With each victim claimed, the monstrous predator grows stronger, fueling a cult’s belief that their dark god has been reborn. Now, the race is on to stop the carnage before evil consumes everything in its path.
Phillips and Prescott also star alongside Tasha Tacosa, Maritza Brikisak, Gigi Gustin (The Retaliators), Adam Marino, and Carl Solomon.
Available on Digital, Blu-ray, and DVD as of June 30 is Jacked, directed by John Fucile from a script he co-wrote with Simon Fraser.
The synopsis: “Set in the summer of 1987, JACKED follows two small-town teenagers whose day at the lake turns into a fight for survival after their car breaks down and they encounter a violent stalker.”
Marla Jean Robison, Tom Koch, Anthony Cipriani, Wynn Reichert, Kam Perez and Bella Marie star.
Get ready to work up a killer sweat and maybe spill some blood with Slashercise, a workout meets slasher hybrid that arrived exclusively on Bloodstream on July 1.
Written and directed by Ama Lea (Deathcember), the retro-styled feature follows “a masked killer known only as Meathead as he stalks the fitness clubs of Los Angeles, turning workout sessions into blood-soaked nightmares. As the city’s top trainers are picked off one by one, a group of determined fitness fanatics must fight back before they become the next bodies on the mat.”
Vanessa Decker (Stiletto), John Bloom (The Last Drive-In With Joe Bob Briggs), Spencer Charnas (Ice Nine Kills), Sarah French (Blind), Kelli Maroney (Night of the Comet), Sarah Nicklin (V/H/S/Halloween), Diana Prince (The Last Drive-In With Joe Bob Briggs), Jared Rivet (The Once and Future Smash), Felissa Rose (Sleepaway Camp), Tiffany Shepis (Victor Crowley), and Lisa Wilcox (A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master) star.
After a record-breaking box office run, A24 and director Kane Parsons’ feature debut is heading back to theaters with bonus footage. AMC Theatres is unleashing Backrooms: Everything Must Go Editiontoday, July 3.
In the film written by Will Soodik, the owner of Cap’n Clark’s Ottoman Empire discovers a strange doorway in the basement of the furniture showroom. He sets out to explore the mysterious, liminal space, walking headfirst into a creepypasta nightmare.
Chiwetel Ejiofor and Renate Reinsvestar.
AMC describes this release as a “theatrically exclusive post-credit” with additional footage from Kane Parsons. Expect 16 minutes of bonus footage, with the new version clocking in at 2 hours and 6 minutes.
The Last Exorcism director Daniel Stamm and Dark Castle Entertainment are back with Lockbox, in select theaters July 3. It adapts Soren Narnia‘s Knifepoint Horror Podcast story “Winthrop” by Emmy-winning playwright Justin Yoffe.
In Lockbox, “Seeking peace after her mother’s death, Ellen retreats to a rural town and takes in her severely traumatized cousin Winthrop. Their fragile domestic balance shatters when an erratic neighbor warns that Winthrop is dangerous. As strange phenomena escalate, Ellen must put everything on the line to defend Winthrop from a dangerous otherworldly entity determined to track him down.”
Lou Taylor Pucci (Touch Me, Evil Dead), Carla Gugino (The Haunting of Hill House, Gerald’s Game, The Fall of the House of Usher) and Katharine Isabelle (Ginger Snaps, Backrooms) star.
This week’s new release roundups are presented by Lockbox.
Be careful who you let in. Carla Gugino and Lou Taylor Pucci star in Lockbox, only in select theaters this Friday. Get tickets.
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