Movies: Hellraiser: Bloodlines | Star Quest

The blood remembers...

Our pick:
1 2 3 4 5

• Hellraiser: Bloodlines
• Rated R
• Starring Bruce Ramsay and Doug Bradley
• 85 minutes

he fourth and final movie in the Hellraiser series opens in the year 2127 on Space Station Minos. Dr. Paul Merchant (Ramsay), the brilliant scientist who created Minos, has stolen the station and ordered its crew back to Earth. Viewing a confinement chamber from a distance, Merchant uses a remote robot to open a puzzle box just as commandos take the space station and arrest him.

Trying to discover why a brilliant man would steal the station, one of the commandos interrogates Merchant. He tells her of the puzzle box and how an ancestor of his from the 18th Century created it.

The ancestor, Phillip Merchant, was a French toy maker. Accepting a challenge, he created an amazing mechanical puzzle box for a lord. Upon payment for his creation, Phillip discovered that the lord was a worshipper of the dark arts who wanted to use the box as a portal to Hell. When Phillip realized that he and his descendants would be forever damned, he determined to create a second box which would destroy the first. In doing so, he began a battle with the demons of Hell that his descendant would have to finish. The battle for his bloodline has raged through the past, present and now to its ultimate conclusion in the future.

Hellraiser: Bloodlines is easily the best of the four Hellraiser movies from Clive Barker. The movie is divided into three parts, covering the past, present and future. Each part is vividly gory as victims are ripped apart, torn to shreds or mutilated in the other unique ways that have made this series a cult hit and its head demon, Pinhead (Bradley), a memorable villain. However, Bloodlines is completely independent from the other Hellraiser movies, and Pinhead is the only recurring character.

Fairly decent special effects for the space scenes add something new to the series. However, telling a good story has never been one of Hellraiser's strong points, and the format of using three episodes proves to be the movie's downfall. The film is ultimately unsatisfying, since its episodic nature prevents the characters and story from truly coming to life. The finale, while visually exciting, is underdeveloped and unfulfilling due to the choppy nature of the movie.

While Ramsay, who portrays all three Merchant characters, attempts to make the three roles different, he doesn't take them far enough. Still, he manages to hold the story together. All of the other interesting characters are demons. Valentina Vargas has lots of fun playing Angelique, a fetching she-demon, and Bradley's Pinhead is what has made the Hellraiser series special. Pinhead will live on in the hearts of Hellraiser fans for a long time to come.

While the violence seems just a bit toned down from the previous films, the movie is done well enough to satisfy fans. Non-fans shouldn't bother. Let's just call it a 4 out of 5 for fans and a 1 out of 5 for non-fans. -- Kathie

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Seven scientists on a desperate mission to save the world find there are more troubling things to worry about

Our pick:
1 2 3 4 5

• Star Quest
• Starring Emma Samms, Brenda Bakke, Steven Bauer
• The Sci-Fi Channel
• Premieres March 16
• 8 p.m. - 10 p.m. EST

n an age where environmental disaster looms on Earth, a crew of seven international specialists is sent into space to investigate Trion, a possibly habitable planet in an unexplored solar system. They spend the 100-year journey in hyperspace before awakening to begin their exploration. However, many things go wrong in quick succession: The crew discovers their captain has been dead for 30 years due to an equipment malfunction. Then the ship's second-in-command hangs himself after reading a classified transmission from Earth. Next, the ship's computer system goes down.

With suicide and suspicions of murder and sabotage weakening the chain of command, the stress level rises among the remaining crew members. Acting on her suspicions that a murderer is among the crew, the ship's technician breaks into the classified communication and discovers that the Earth that they left behind has been obliterated by nuclear holocaust. It seems likely that they are the only survivors.

Another crew member dies under suspicious circumstances, but by this time the remaining personnel are already exhibiting signs of severe psychological deterioration. All they have left are statutes and regulations, but this seems inconsequential in light of the fact that society and culture no longer exist. Everyone is suspect, and escapism, whether through virtual reality or drugs, abounds.

There are two main questions that Star Quest effectively raises: 1) What is the value of life? 2) How much can the producers lift from Alien without actually getting sued? For a second-tier production, Star Quest actually does all right inquiring into meaningful conditions for life, but it is essentially a cheaper rehash of many finer apocalyptic films. There is also a predictable twist at the end, but it somehow manages some slightly original torque on its own.

The cast is mostly below average, shambling aimlessly through their roles. Emma Samms is uninspired but acceptable, and Ming-Na Wen (currently on NBC's The Single Guy) is passable. Both Cliff DeYoung and Alan Rachins have a terrible time maintaining their (sometimes even audible) French and Middle Eastern accents and neither seems to care much. The only good performances are those of Brenda Bakke and Steven Bauer. Bakke lends the entire production much needed credibility and tension, and Bauer turns a thankless role as a beefcake into an emotional anchor and a thankfully average, believable, good guy.

Nothing is missed by not seeing Star Quest, but conversely, tuning in is not a waste of time either. The plot moves along swiftly, although frequently with jerks and skips like an old vinyl album on a turntable. Anything good it does it has borrowed slavishly from other sources, but despite this, at times it is definitely worth watching.

I still don't understand what the title Star Quest has to do with the movie. But it's nice to see that Roger Corman is still making a living (he's the executive producer). -- Tamara I.

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