The concept of hell has a different meaning for different people. To the overly religious, hell may seem like the place for repentance, facing the consequences of their sins. While to the atheist, hell is nothing but a figment of human imagination — a far-out imaginary place with no real-world implications. The narrative around hell and heaven has always aimed to create a stark contrast between the two, with hell being represented with angry shades of red, heat, and mutilated demons, whereas heaven is a cool, windy blue, with graceful souls inhabiting the realm with no worry whatsoever.
While the conventional description of hell is scary and paints a violent picture. Overtime, the impact of hell’s potency has deteriorated, and we have gotten desensitized to the full scale of horror experienced in hell. However, some descriptions of hell are truly terrifying, not because they play off the conventional narrative of a demon in red, torturing the soul of a human on a bed of fire, but because the torture is more mental than psychical… If the mind breaks, the body follows. Here’s a list of the scariest versions of hell in movies, ranked.
7 Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1998)
Hellbound: Hellraiser II is a horror film directed by Tony Randel. The film is a sequel to Hellraiser, which was released a year earlier. Hellraiser’s setup revolves around a British military officer, who opens a mysterious box known as the lament configuration, which in turn summons otherworldly beings known as cenobites. The sequel explores the origins of the cenobites. Setting the story in hell, which is depicted as a steely, cool, never-ending labyrinth of nothingness. Despite heavy budget restrictions, the Hellraiser franchise manages to create a blend of goth along with gore creating a distinct world that fits perfectly with its storyline.
6 Errementari: The Blacksmith and the Devil (2017)
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- Kinoskopik Film Produktion
If Hellraiser’s hell was a steely labyrinth, Errementari’s hell is portrayed in a more conventional sense. Inspired by traditional Basque folklore, Errementari is director Paul Urkijo Alice’s attempt at submerging the viewer right into the depths of hell's gates. Oddly terrifying and funny in equal measure, Errementari is what you get when you spin a traditional horror film on its head, creating a man-made version of hell right in the middle of our everyday lives.
5 Drag Me To Hell (2009)
After he made Spider-Man and The Evil Dead, Sam Raimi made Drag Me To Hell. A cult classic that still holds water in the current horror scenario. Drag Me To Hell revolves around Christine Brown (Alison Lohman), a loan officer who’s condemned to hell after being cursed by an old Romani lady. The film approaches horror with a sense of morality when Brown realizes that the old woman has set a demon loose on her through a curse. The demon, known as Lamia has a very distinct way of torture that imitates the actions of the person on whom the Lamia is set loose. If you’re in the mood for intelligent horror with a decent moral sensibility, don’t miss out on Drag Me To Hell.
4 Jigoku (1960)
If there’s a mother ship of films that have been at the source of defining a genre, Jigoku is that film and J-horror is that genre. Considered to be a classic J-horror film that has laid the pathway for other films in the genre like Kwaidan and Onibaba. Jigoku, directed by the legendary Nobuo Nakagawa, revolves around Shiro, whose life is ruined after a hit-and-run case. Jigoku, literally translates to hell, and that’s what becomes of Shiro’s world. The film explores not only Shiro’s sins and repentance, but of those around him, his family, his village, the family of the man he killed…
Where death begins, normal films end. Not with Jigoku, Jigoku comes to life with death, almost celebrating it in a weirdly sadistic way. In the 3rd act of the film, all the sinners are sent to hell where they go through extreme infinite moments of torture, from being flayed alive, to having to drink pus instead of water… Jigoku is not an easy film to experience and not one to forget.
3 What Dreams May Come (1998)
Hell is often associated with pain and torment. But what pain could be worse than losing someone you love forever? What Dreams May Come by director Vincent Ward is based on this premise. After his death, Chris Neilson (Robin Williams), finds himself in heaven, but after his wife commits suicide, Nelson decides to swap the comfort of heaven for the eternal loneliness of hell to search for his wife’s spirit.
What Dreams May Come, has a very interestingly haunting depiction of hell. There are no demons, no eternal flames of fire, no demons agonizing sinners. Rather, the hell depicted in the film consists of a never-ending expanse of dry land, but the land isn’t made of soil. Instead, it's made up of upturned faces and tightly crammed bodies, all looking up with haunting eyes as Neilson walks over them to look for his wife.
2 Baskin (2015)
The Salt Company
Baskin, is Turkish filmmaker Can Evrenol’s debut film. The plot revolves around a group of police officers, who get a distress call over the radio. Obligated to check it out, the group arrives at an abandoned, haunted-looking building. As they enter the building to investigate, they find themselves in a sinister, surrealistic world, from which there's no apparent way out. Baskin’s hell is full of blood and gore and serves as a classic example of active, sadistic horror, where you feel like you’re stuck and invested with the protagonist as they writhe and crawl through the depths of hell.
1 Constantine (2005)
Constantine revolves around an exorcist named Constantine (Keanu Reeves) who’s roped in by a detective to investigate the mysterious death of her twin sister. As Constantine delves deeper into the case, he realizes there’s much more than meets the eye. Finding himself right in the middle of an eternal war between God and Satan, Constantine has to burn half-demons in the flames of fire if he has a shot at entering heaven. The imagery of hell portrayed in the film gives post-apocalyptic vibes, with thick clouds of smoke overlapping with snappy tongues of fire.