© Clive Barker

It's no real surprise how uncommon it is for fiction writers to work just as ably in the movies as they do on the page. Writing is a solitary activity, filmmaking a collaborative one. And for a writer not only to excel in the field of screenwriting but to prove himself a gifted director is rarer still. Clive Barker has made these transitions with impressive results, even though the film industry seems to have had the better of him in some ways. Some of Barker's adaptability is likely owing to the stage dramas he wrote and produced before reinventing fantastic fiction. He also developed some of his directorial chops when he made a couple of independent art films in the '70s: "Salome" and "The Forbidden." Barker's 1987 feature film debut, "Hellraiser," retains traces of the plays he wrote, as well as the two short films, but it also foreshadows some of the innovations that would come to mark his next two films and much of his fiction.

"Hellraiser" is the film that brought him to the attention of many of his current legion of fans. Of course the voiceover for the trailers, announcing that Stephen King had seen the future of horror and its name was Clive Barker, didn't hinder the film's prospects any, but it's hard to imagine a more effective debut horror film; astonishing that it was directed by someone who was and remains primarily a writer. Fiction writers of Barker's caliber (and there aren't many) seldom make any kind of direct contribution to the film industry. It's rare enough for a novelist, say, to even turn out a screenplay that becomes a wholly satisfying film. But here was a young man adapting his own novella and making it into one of the most respected horror films of the '80s. Quite a feat.

The second of the Barker-directed films was "Nightbreed" in 1990. Like so many of the projects Barker has teased us with in interviews over the years, "Nightbreed" was to be part of a large-scale mythology. It was to be the first part of a trilogy: the horror genre's "Star Wars." Well, fans are still waiting for the follow-ups. My guess is that even if the books one day emerge, the film versions never will. Ordinarily it wouldn't be worth lamenting the absence of two more sequels in a genre that's drowning in them, but these might have been something special if Barker had followed the pattern suggested by the first film--namely, if he had written the stories they were to be based on, scripted the films and taken up the director's chair. It wouldn't have been another "Hellraiser" franchise, that's for sure. But maybe there's a significance to the closing tableau of "Nightbreed" that would have receded if the other two chapters had indeed followed. Those Breed who haven't been killed off by the bloodthirsty humans of the film have congregated in a remote barn. Their savior, Boone, is among them, and all eyes are on the future, uncertain though it is. The camera pulls out of the barn and continues to move back, bringing a star-filled night into the picture before the closing credits roll. It's a powerful expression of the monsters' predicament. We may still understand very little of the ways of these creatures who had made their home beneath a sprawling graveyard before human interference led to its destruction and left them without a haven from the natural world. But in Barker's closing shot, we are invited to pity them all and share in their hope of finding another refuge. Danny Elfman's music ain't bad, either.

With "Lord of Illusions" in 1995 Barker had found his tempo. He no longer had anything to prove and was therefore able to create a very relaxed horror picture. It's not as scary as "Hellraiser" or as stylized as "Nightbreed," but it's a professional piece of business from start to finish. It also boasts the star power of Scott Bakula in the lead role of Harry D'Amour, a kind of Sam Spade who's drawn to the more anomalous varieties of criminal activity. That is to say, the forces of darkness. The film is constantly on risky terrain, juggling as it does the genres of horror and film noir. But its footing is as sure as a Spanish billygoat's because Barker has a way of bringing the unbelievable into focus. In "Illusions" he brilliantly uses as a backdrop for his frightening story the esoteric world of magicians and illusionists. We know that women don't really get sawed in half. We know that behind every card trick there's an empirical explanation. But most of us don't know what those explanations are. We're pretty easily held in thrall of the magician, even the most skeptical among us. That's the chink of doubt that Clive Barker pries open for us with his incomparable flair for the supernatural. Along the way, he gives us one of his most terrifying creations: Nix, the crazed cult leader with certain abilities that are matched only by his appetite for power.

If forced to choose, most of Barker's fans would probably rather see him focus his energies on novel-writing than filmmaking. After all, he has some loose ends to tie up in his fiction, too (the final book of "The Art" trilogy, the sequel to "Galilee," etc.). And if he never directs again, at least we can probably count on him to have his hands in the production of various projects, as he did with "Gods and Monsters." Surely his fiction will periodically be adapted by others, too; his "Abarat" series of children's books, for which he is creating a staggering body of original paintings, is already bound for that path. At any rate, I hope that if Clive Barker ever does decide to climb back into the director's chair he'll do it before our desire to see it happen is outweighed by our fear that he may have lost his rhythm as a filmmaker.

Director Filmography:
Tortured Souls	2004
Lord of Illusions	1995
Nightbreed	1990
Hellraiser	1987
The Forbidden	1978
Salome	1973
Full IMDb Filmography