Hellraiser: Inferno

Hellraiser: Inferno is a 2000 American horror film. It is the fifth installment in the Hellraiser series, and the first Hellraiser film to be released direct-to-video. It was directed by Scott Derrickson and released on October 3, 2000. The film is about a corrupt detective who discovers Lemarchand's box at a crime scene, which results in his life gradually unraveling.

Plot
Detective Joseph Thorne, a shady LA detective inconsiderate to those around him, investigates the murder of Jay Cho, who was killed by hooked chains after solving the Lament Configuration, which Joseph finds under a candle with the finger of a child in it. After cheating on his wife Melanie with a hooker named Daphne, Joseph solves the Lament Configuration in a motel and seems to have a dream where he meets the Wire Twin Cenobites, a second Chatterer Cenobite (who has no legs), and finally Pinhead, who tears his face apart before he wakes up to find it a dream.

When Joseph goes to the police station, he receives a call from Daphne, who is being attacked. Joseph and his partner Tony Nenonen investigate and find her dead, killed with a weapon made from hooks of body piercing, and another child's finger that analysis shows was cut off while alive. A fingerprint on the Lament Configuration matches that of a man named Leon. When Joseph questions him, he says he is working for a violent serial killer called the Engineer.

Joseph begins looking for the Engineer. A kid gives him a tape, showing the Engineer (who has a strange, Cenobite-like mask on) killing Bernie, Joseph's snitch. When others examine the tape, it seems to be erased, but Bernie is found dead in his ice cream truck with another finger of the kid, whom Joseph is determined to find. Dr. Paul Gregory, a psychiatrist, seems to know a lot about the Engineer, as well as the Lament Configuration. Due to his connection to the victims, he is suspected to be the killer.

After Joseph returns home, he receives a phone call from his mother, saying that the Engineer is in their room, while unaware that he is a serial killer. Joseph has never been to see his mother or his father, who is extremely ill, further showing how neglective he is. When he gets there, they are alive and there is no sign of the Engineer. He walks into a room resembling his childhood home before waking up in his house. Afterward the next events repeat, with the phone call about the Engineer in his mother and father's room. This time, when Joseph arrives, his parents are dead, and two more fingers are at the scene.

Joseph looks through a window and sees Tony being murdered by the Engineer. He receives a phone call telling him to go home. Joseph arrives to see his wife and daughter dead, crumbling into pieces. Paul Gregory appears, it having been him who made the call and intending for Joseph to go to his childhood home. He is seemingly revealed as the Engineer, and reveals his true identity to be Pinhead. Joseph goes to his childhood home, where he views a flashback to when he was a kid. He is then attacked by everyone who the Engineer killed, and shoots them all. He then enters a dark room, and finds the kid whose fingers were cut off, and discovers that it is him. The Engineer removes his mask to reveal he is also Joseph.

Pinhead explains that Joseph is in hell since he solved the box, that the kid represents his soul and the Engineer represents his flesh, damaging his soul. The kid has one finger left for one more death; Pinhead tears Joseph apart with his hooked chains. He wakes up on the floor of the motel, and thinks the whole thing a dream until Daphne calls him at the police station, and he realizes the whole ordeal is starting over again, so he shoots himself in the mouth and wakes up on the hotel floor again, and realizes he is doomed to repeat this moment and face his demons for eternity.

Why It Sucks

 * 1) This film is unnecessary, due to the previous film, Hellraiser: Bloodline, completing and concluding the timeline.
 * 2) The plot is a tiring mess, with a Groundhog Day inspired plot and many scenes that either don't make sense, don't contribute to the story, or both.
 * 3) Mediocre to horrible characters:
 * 4) *Joseph Thorne, the protagonist, is incredibly unlikable, shallow, boring, and uninteresting. While having an unlikable protagonist isn't a bad thing, Joseph is not written well, nor executed well.
 * 5) *Tony Nenonen, Joseph's partner, is also not interesting, making him hard to care about.
 * 6) *Dr. Paul Gregory is a boring and bland character who is barely in the movie, even though he's the important Engineer character.
 * 7) *Melanie and Chloe are barely given any screen time and have almost no character, despite being Joseph's wife and daughter.
 * 8) *Pinhead is barely in the movie and isn't as compelling or intriguing as he was in the previous installments.
 * 9) *The Cenobites are dull, have little personality, and have little screen time. However, they also have more screen time than Pinhead, despite being nothing but characterless creatures.
 * 10) Because of the psychological horror direction, the film has many confusing moments, and tries to use the excuse of it being psychological to cover up errors.
 * 11) The Hellraiser aspects, such as the Lament Configuration and Cenobites, are so lazy, uninspired, and are just shoved in. This is due to the original script not being a Hellraiser project.
 * 12) While it's understandable that the filmmakers weren't aiming to rely on gore, the gore and kills are still quite tame and underwhelming, and the kills don't match the Hellraiser series that well.
 * 13) Plot hole: At around 1 hour and 6 minutes, Joseph is killed and wakes up in his bed with his wife. This goes against the rule that when Joseph is killed, he wakes up in the motel room, where he solved the Lament Configuration.
 * 14) Mediocre cinematography and CGI effects.
 * 15) Unlike the previous films, this movie has no reason why it's called "Inferno". Nothing involving fire happens in this movie. This shows that there was little care put into making this a Hellraiser installment.
 * 16) *Hellbound: Hellraiser II makes sense because Kirsty is searching for her father, who is stuck in hell.
 * 17) *Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth makes sense because Pinhead's motivation is to literally bring hell on Earth.
 * 18) *Hellraiser: Bloodline makes sense because the story stretches out across 3 time periods, all focusing on Lemarchand/Merchant family members.
 * 19) Some scenes are flat out ridiculous. One example is when Joseph gets randomly attacked by ninja cowboys.
 * 20) The pacing is inconsistent, with some parts of the story happening to fast, and other parts being dragged out for long periods of time, specifically the third act.
 * 21) The ending is an underwhelming plot twist about how Joseph created his own hell.

Redeeming Qualities

 * 1) The acting is decent, mainly from Craig Sheffer and Doug Bradley.
 * 2) The practical effects are pretty good.
 * 3) The opening credits are interesting and engaging.
 * 4) This movie could've been better had it not been changed into a Hellraiser film.

Reception
Hellraiser: Inferno received mixed to negative reviews, largely because the film was not originally written to be a Hellraiser sequel, and the tone resembles more of a psychological horror film than a body horror film as the first few films were.

Trivia

 * This is the first Hellraiser film that wasn't originally a Hellraiser project.

Videos
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PERD6dnxhwU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T15oh_fiOEM