"'Hellbound' is a film of many excesses - beyond the blood, there's the heightened sound of pain, some bizarre sexuality and a slew of sadistic effects. Barker's original conception was intriguing: an ornate puzzle box serves as a passage into an underworld (the Outer Darkness) where the thin line between pleasure and pain is constantly being tested both by weak-willed humans who fall under the box's power and its citizen Cenobites, ghastly demons who embody, in extremely visual ways, all their realized perversions... Even if you discount the cliche's, there are enough bizarre and shocking effects here to satisfy all but the most demanding genre fans." - Richard Harrington, Washington Post