Hi-Death — Hi-Death(DVD)

Hi-Death is a 2018 anthology taking in five tales from underground horror directors. From the known such as Tim Ritter (Truth Or Dare, Killing Spree), Todd Sheets (Moonchild, Dead Things) and Brad Sykes (Camp Blood 1 & 2). To the lesser known Anthony Catanese & Amanda Payton.  It’s a consistent collection of tales- with a good mix of chills, gore, and macabre wackness.  Here from Wild Eyes' Raw & Extreme series is a DVD release of the film- taking in producer & director commentaries, and a making of.

The film has a total runtime of one hour and forty-two minutes- with a good & fair mix of stories- with each running around the right time for impact & effect. We open with the wrap-around story which is entitled Terror Tour (directed by Brad Sykes)- which finds two female friends 
on a holiday in LA. While walking around the Hollywood walk Of Fame, the Chinese Theatre, and other tourist spots- they find a flyer for a horror tour around the city- they just have to scan it- and from here they go from one location to another- between each watching a story on their mobile phone. This is okay as a wrap-around- with a neat enough resolve.

The first tale up is Death Has a Conscience which was written & directed by Anthony Catanese. It regards a twenty-something female drug addict who starts off the tale trying to score at various metal/hard-core punk shows. She finds her man scores and shoots up- though it’s very strong- so the dealer drops her off at a dead-end motel.  It turns out that 'death' himself has set up in the room. In time he appears,  and rather regrets his career path. This one has some neat moments of creepiness and some fleeting gore.

Next, we have Dealers In Death- this was written & directed by Tim Ritter, it’s one of the longer stories here, as well as being decidedly deranged/ wackily macabre. It focuses on Marty Lustig (Todd Martin) a bald, tattooed, and clearly unhinged man who is an obsessive collector of serial killer-related items- funding his needs by stealing from his drug dealer.  Among the items he gets on the black market are the camera of sex killer (with unsettling snuff footage on), the rope a killer used, the skull of a victim and more- which he gets down & dirty with his girlfriend with. This one resolves in a wonderfully deranged & rather stomach-churning manner- with some neatly quirky Ritter touches.

Story number three is Night Drop- it’s written/ directed by Amanda Payton. This is based in a DVD rental shop, where a male employee stays late at night after closing to tidy up/ etc.  Here we get a few moments of creepiness- though equally, we get a rather muddled meant to unsettling montage scene (in its length we get a brief shot from excellent serial killer found footage/ mockumentary The Poughkeepsie Tapes). This was the lesser of the five stories for me.

Story four is Cold Read- written/ directed by Brad Sykes. This one regards an actress going to read a part for a film, and the director is very trying to say the least. This one is okay- with some quite intense violence in it and a neat enough twist- though there are some real sound issues with this one- and at points it’s difficult to make out what is been said.

Finally, we have The Muse- written/ directed by Todd Sheets. This one regards a sat-in-his-underpants artist who is painting macabre & deranged paintings for some form of demon. He’s using the body fluids of people he gets to come to his rundown room. This one has nice Lovecraft undertones, an extremely blood-on-breasts scene, and a fair bit of nudity towards its end. This one is middling I guess- but entertaining enough.

So, all in all Hi-Death is a consistent horror anthology- I’d say my favourite of the stories are Dealers In Death & Death Has a Conscience- in that order.

Moving onto this region free DVD from Wild Eye. And on the extras front, we get several commentaries- so you can either play a track from each director/ writer, or listen to a joint track from executive producers Christopher Rosso, Brad & Josephina Sykes- I played the latter. The three start by talking about the issues of filming on Hollywood Boulevard, how they had three separate attempts at getting shots of the stars and dealing with the homeless in the area. They talk about how this film came about because of the popularity of the previous horror analogy they worked on HI-8. They discuss how they selected each director, going on to comment on each segment as they appear- pointing out things such as favourite shots, locations, etc. All in all, a track worth a play. Otherwise, we get a behind-the-scenes/ making of (16.48), and trailers.

So, if you have a penchant for low-budget, gory, at times wacky horror anthologies Hi-Death will be for you. Let us hope this one goes down well because it would be great to see another sequel from these producers/ directors.