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Home Page
Hellraiser
(1987)
Album Cover Art
1987 Cinedisc
1987 Silva Screen
Album 2 Cover Art
2012 BSX
Album 3 Cover Art
2017 Lakeshore
Album 4 Cover Art
Composed, Orchestrated, and Produced by:

Conducted by:
Paul Francis Witt
Labels Icon
LABELS & RELEASE DATES
Cinedisc/Silva Screen
(1987)

BSX Records
(November 15th, 2012)

Lakeshore Records
(October 6th, 2017)
Availability Icon
ALBUM AVAILABILITY
All the albums have been regular commercial releases. The 2012 BSX Records album with the sequel score as well is out of print and has sold for over $50. The 2017 Lakeshore Records remastering is a "30th Anniversary Edition."
Awards
AWARDS
None.
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ALSO SEE





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   Availability | Viewer Ratings | Comments | Track Listings | Notes
Buy it... if you admire gothic horror scores and Christopher Young's heralded definition of them, the original Hellraiser offering an early glimpse of the majesty to come from the composer over the following decades.

Avoid it... if you'd prefer to sacrifice the stronger narrative of this score for the choral immensity and improved sound of Young's wilder, rowdy sequel score in the franchise.
Review Icon
EDITORIAL REVIEW
FILMTRACKS TRAFFIC RANK: #2,292
WRITTEN 5/9/24
Young
Young
Hellraiser: (Christopher Young) Although horror franchises were all the rage in the 1980's, few audiences had seen the outrageous gore and erotic sadomasochism of the likes filmmaker Clove Barker brought to the Hellraiser franchise starting in 1987. The supernatural horror concept postulated that a parallel dimension of undead, torture obsessed freaks called the Cenobites achieve pleasure from the pain of others, and a mystical puzzle box in our world can open a portal to that hell-like realm. When one rather unlikeable fellow, Frank Cotton, obtains and solves the puzzle, he is torn apart and left to assemble his own body via the blood of others in a purgatory-like state. His not-so-innocent family investigates his fate and battles the Cenobites as everyone associated seeks more and more blood. The existence of the puzzle box and the Cenobites, and particularly their leader, Pinhead (notable for nails coming out of his head in a grid pattern), is the glue that holds the whole franchise of films together. The first two Hellraiser movies were a self-contained narrative featuring mostly the same characters whereas the countless sequels, most of which failing to achieve theatrical releases, explored separate parades of doomed flesh. The gore fetish element is matched by the extreme sexuality of the concept, Barker obtaining X ratings on the first two movies before removing some of the sexual and violent depictions. One of his famous complaints about working with the censors included the hilarious line: "The MPAA told me I was allowed two consecutive buttock thrusts from Frank but three is deemed obscene!" The movie was initially banned in parts of Canada because of the same depravity, mainly the glorification of dismemberment. Barker had seen the success of electronic film scores in horror movies earlier in the decade and originally hired English industrial electronic music duo Coil to provide the music for Hellraiser, and they wrote a substantial amount of material as a demo for the project. Before long, however, both the filmmakers and Coil realized that the band's music was unlikely to fit well with the feel of the movie, and they parted amicably.


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VIEWER RATINGS
147 TOTAL VOTES
Average: 3.57 Stars
***** 36 5 Stars
**** 48 4 Stars
*** 36 3 Stars
** 19 2 Stars
* 8 1 Stars
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Track Listings Icon
TRACK LISTINGS
All Albums Tracks   ▼Total Time: 74:27
• 1. Hellraiser (1:43)
• 2. Resurrection (2:32)
• 3. Hellbound Heart (5:05)
• 4. The Lament Configuration (3:31)
• 5. Reunion (3:11)
• 6. A Quick Death (1:16)
• 7. Seduction and Pursuit (3:01)
• 8. In Love's Name (2:56)
• 9. The Cenobites (4:13)
• 10. The Rat Slice Quartet (3:15)
• 11. Re-resurrection (2:34)
• 12. Uncle Frank (2:59)
• 13. Brought On by Night (2:18)
• 14. Another Puzzle (4:06)
(Music from Hellraiser appears only on CD 1 of the 2012 set.)

Notes Icon
NOTES AND QUOTES
The insert of the 2012 BSX album includes details about the score and film.
Copyright © 2024-2025, Filmtracks Publications. All rights reserved.
The reviews and other textual content contained on the filmtracks.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten
or redistributed without the prior written authority of Christian Clemmensen at Filmtracks Publications. All artwork and sound clips from Hellraiser are Copyright © 1987, 2012, 2017, Cinedisc/Silva Screen, BSX Records, Lakeshore Records and cannot be redistributed without the label's expressed written consent. Page created 5/9/24 (and not updated significantly since).
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