The 80's were a golden age for horror films and I don't think modern cinema is able to emulate the aura that these first couple of Hellraiser movies contained from that era.
What did you think of Hellbound: Hellraiser II?
(http://fight-evil.com/movies/h/hellraiser2-1988/1.jpg)
Just got my review up.
What it boils down to is the fact that this movie occasionally really doesn't make sense, or at least it doesn't go out of the way to fully explain some stuff. Cool ideas (Cenobites originally being human, for instance), but not fleshed out that well.
Still, visuals are amazing, and when all's said and done, it basically reaches the levels of the first (gave the first an 8/10, and this one a 7.5/10).
Your review prompted me to look at some of the other reviews for it. Crash guessed that the budget for Hellraiser 2 was less than the first, but it seems it had an estimated triple the budget that the first had. [*hehehmm*]