Posted in: Movies, Recent Updates | Tagged: hellraiser, patrick lussier, todd farmer

Two Steps Back For The Hellraiser Remake And Halloween 3D

It's been a long road for Dimension's planned remake of Hellraiser. Recently, Todd Farmer and Patrick Lussier have been working on a script. At the same time, Dimension churned out yet another painfully awful direct-to-DVD sequel called Hellraiser: Revelations, in order to hold on to the property rights a little bit longer.*

Revelations was rushed out so fast that Doug Bradley turned down the role of Pinhead for the first time, implying that not only was the film put into production far too fast, but also that he read the script and didn't think much of it. Clive Barker himself has virulently discredited the film via Twitter, saying that:

Hello, my friends. I want to put on record that the flick out there using the word 'Hellraiser' is no f*cking child of mine … I have nothing to do with the f*cking thing. If they claim its from the mind of Clive Barker, it's a lie. It's not even from my butt-hole.

Perhaps that's something to do with why the Hellraiser remake has suffered yet another setback.

At a recent signing event, Farmer and Lussier were heard repeatedly explaining to fans that it was becoming increasingly unlikely that the film would ever happen with them attached. They had already churned out a number of different possible scripts, but ended up clashing with Dimension Films over the issue of making a family-friendly horror movie.In an interview with Bloody Disgusting, Farmer had this to say.

We developed several versions for Dimension, but in the end we never saw eye to eye creatively. We wish them the best and look forward to seeing what they come up with … We did our draft of 'Halloween' right before we went off to do 'Drive Angry', then, right AFTER 'Drive Angry' they asked us to do 'Hellraiser'. Originally what they wanted was epic and dark, rated R. It was in our contract. So… if WE do 'Hellraiser', it's rated R; if they want to do PG-13 then they have to get rid of us. I know PG-13's always discussed. To me it seems impossible to do 'Hellraiser' as a PG-13, and it seems DIFFICULT to do 'Halloween' as PG-13. What we wrote was definitely not PG-13.

While we're on the subject of horror remakes struggling to make it out of the gate, Halloween 3D was also, for a while, in the hands of Todd Farmer, and while the prospects seem slightly brighter here it's going to be a while before we get to see Michael Myers' knife popping out of the screen.

In the same interview Farmer had this to say about it:

Since so much time has gone by, I don't think a sequel to Rob's 'Halloween II' would still play, so I'm not sure that our original script would work … We literally started ours five minutes before Rob's movie ended. So much time has gone by… there have been other things discussed, other ways to tell that story. The date has been set. October of 2012. And even that can be pushed forward if the movie's ready, like the last couple. They're listening to ideas and pitches… I don't know what the future holds, but I know there will be another one.

While you're waiting for these remakes-or-sequels-that-might-be, I'd recommend just renting out the original Halloween and Hellraiser, sticking them in your DVD player, switching off all the lights, and wetting yourself in terror.

Though not necessarily in that order.

*Brendon's note: I'm not sure Hannah has seen it. Because she's prejudged it, I'm going to make her review it. In detail.

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