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Clive Barker’s “Hellraiser” franchise<\/a> used to have such sights to show us. The original movie, adapted from Barker’s own “The Hellbound Heart” novella, is a warped masterpiece about dysfunctional family drama and taboo-shattering depravity \u2014 one that introduced viewers to the Cenobites, horror’s greatest (and weirdest) villains<\/a>. The following three films (beginning with the excellent “Hellbound: Hellraiser II” and ending with the underrated, but could have been better, “Hellraiser: Bloodline”<\/a>) differ in quality, but they are full of ideas that elevate them beyond typical hack-and-slash fare. Everything that comes after \u2014 well, most fans don’t want to talk about those doom-and-gloom years (and for good reason).\u00a0That said, one unrealized sequel, “Hellraiser: Lament,” could have breathed life back into the Cenobites during that down period, but as is always the case with things that are too good to be true, it wasn’t to be.<\/p>\n Peter Briggs is one of the best Hollywood screenwriters you’ve never heard of. He is perhaps best-known for contributing to 2004’s “Hellboy,” but most of his projects are either stuck in development hell or have since been retooled by other filmmakers (“Alien vs. Predator, “Freddy vs. Jason,” and “Judge Dredd,” to name some examples). After writing an impressive spec script for “Freddy vs. Jason” in the 1990s, Dimension approached Briggs to write a treatment for the seventh installment in the “Hellraiser” film series \u2014 and let’s just say that his idea sounds more interesting than the DTV sequel that was released in its place.<\/p>\n So, what was “Lament” about, why did it get canceled, and how could it have saved a property that started out so promising only to have legendary suffering inflicted upon it? Let’s dig in.<\/p>\n