| Clive Barker was born by Cesarean on October 5, 1952, near
Penny Lane, Liverpool. He first realized he could scare people with his words telling
stories around a campfire with fellow Boy Scouts when he was ten years old. It gave him
"a lovely sense of power." He started out writing and directing plays for a
fringe theater company he formed in London, producing works such as "Frankenstein in
Love," "The History of the Devil," and "Colossus," a play about
his favorite painter, Goya. These plays often delved into the erotic, the fantastical, and
the horrific, themes that he would later become known for in his literary work. Many of
his plays have been collected in two books, "Incarnations" and "Forms of
Heaven." In his spare time, Barker wrote short horror fiction, not expecting to be able to sell it. However, the first publisher he showed it to asked for more, and his stories were published in three volumes in 1984, under the title, "The Books of Blood". Moderately successful in Great Britain, the Books found wide critical acclaim in the United States, and now appear in over a dozen languages. Today, Barker's Seraphim Films is involved in CD-ROMs, live theater and art, as well as film and television production. Barker has done everything from major motion pictures for Universal to creating a line of superhero comics for Marvel called Razorline. |
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After two "disappointing" movies based on his material flopped, Barker decided to try his hand at directing films himself. He adapted the story The Hellbound Heart for the screen and the result was the widely popular Hellraiser, starring Doug Bradley as the infamous angel of the underworld, the Cennobite known as Pinhead. The movie spawned three sequels, and has become one of the most popular horror movie series in the past decade. (The three sequels, while quite good, pale in comparison to the original, probably because of Barker's lack of involvement with the sequels. Just a hunch. --Auth.) Other Barker films include Nightbreed, Candyman, and Lord of Illusions. All of these films have benefited from Barker's exceptional writing and direction. They are all "must-sees" for any horror movie fan. |
