Hellraiser III Hell On Earth Hellraiser III: Hell On Earth Soundtrack CD

Horror movies and heavy metal were made for each other, and to accompany the man with the pincushion head on his third venture into theaters, Clive Barker gathered together stray tracks from the likes of Motörhead, KMFDM, and Triumph, not to mention (how'd they get in here?) Tin Machine, for an album's worth of headbanging. But without the movie, it's all somewhat, uh, bloodless. ~ William Ruhlmann

As is typically the case in multiple-sequel situations, the second movie in the Hellraiser series, Hellbound: Hellraiser II, retained many of the elements of the first, including some members of the cast and the composer, Christopher Young, while the third, Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth, took a different tack with mostly new characters, a completely different setting, and a new composer, Randy Miller. The challenge in such extensions from the original is the contradictory one of being "the same but different," and Miller had to pick up from Young's gothic, symphonic score (excerpts of which were retained in the third film), while also taking into consideration the movement from England to what was supposed to be New York City (though the film was actually shot in Greensboro, NC), and also maintain a certain consistency with a set of hard rock tracks that served as source music in the film's frequently used nightclub set. (A separate soundtrack album with those tracks was also issued.) Within those restrictions, Miller, employing the Mosfilm State Orchestra and Choir, managed well, producing a score that contained more generic thriller music and fewer distinctive elements than Young's, but that did the job of supporting the appropriate plot points. Every soundtrack album is to a certain extent an after-the-fact reconstruction, not the score as heard in the movie theater, but that is particularly the case here. The movie runs 93 minutes, and there simply isn't 46 minutes of scoring in it, as there is on this disc. On the album, Miller gets to flesh out and complete such pieces as the six and a half minutes of "Emergency Room," but on film the actual music used is much shorter. The composer has fulfilled his assignment here, but it was a limited one. ~ William Ruhlmann

Original score composed by Randy Miller.