“Hellbound: Hellraiser II” is the second instalment in the “Hellraiser” franchise and it’s about as good if not better than the first film, although that’s not saying too much. There the film has no logical order, it’s essentially just one gross image after another but at least the makers put some effort into being creative about the gross imagery.

“Hellbound” features no real story as such; we know that the girl Kirsty (Ashley Laurence), who was in the first film, finds herself once again the victim of various demonic forces unleashed by a puzzle box. There’s an awful lot of running around corridors, screaming, skin being sliced and horrifying monsters laughing.

The acting in this film is terrible. Nearly everybody in this film ranging from Kenneth Cranham (“Layer Cake”) to Ashley Laurence is laughably bad and delivers stupid lines of dialog. Of course, you didn’t come here for the people; you came for the monsters and “Hellbound” has a lot of them. There’s Pinhead (Doug Bradley) and the rest of the Cennobites, who don’t do a great deal and spend an awful lot of time just talking about pain and suffering. The best visual though is during a hysterical and creative scene in which a woman loses her sort of ‘suit’ of skin.

“Hellbound” has a great score and at times, it has impressive visuals but you can’t escape the facts that there’s no real plot, the acting is terrible and that there is no real point to anything here. If you enjoyed the first “Hellraiser”, “Hellbound” will give you even more monsters and skin slicing but for everybody else, you’re left with a visually striking but ultimately very nonsensical picture. Maybe if the filmmakers can actually think of a purpose for the monsters, we may, just may be onto something.