“From the makers of “Hi-8”, five new tales to blow your mind. When two young women take the “Terror Tour” through the underbelly of Hollywood, they are led into a bizarre world of unspeakable horror.”

Hi-Death is an anthology that’s framed around two friends touring Hollywood and randomly receive a flyer offering the “Terror Tour”. On this tour, they will watch short horror films at various locations. As with most anthologies, the framing part can be hit or miss. In this case, it’s a hard miss. Besides being poorly edited and having questionable sound quality, it’s just boring. The leads are capable but given the material, it’s just a matter of going through the motions.

Death Has a Conscience: A junkie goes to a hotel room to recover but she gets unexpected visitors. This is probably the weakest of the bunch. The costume design shows that this was filmed on a shoestring budget while the dialogue comes off as pretentious.

Dealers of Death: A collector of murder memorabilia gets more than he bargained for. This story is better than the last though not by much. The script is better written but the effects are still something left over from last Halloween.

Night Drop: Your next movie rental may be your last with this haunted DVD story. This segment is kind of odd in the sense that the set up takes place in a movie rental store and involves a clerk with some bad luck. While it’s interesting and better than those before it, nothing really stands out.

Cold Read: An actress’ worst nightmare unfolds when she shows up to an unusual audition. This is easily the strongest out of all the stories thanks to the lead. She expertly conveys the desperation and confusion of the character. I would say the whole film is better because of the segment.

The Muse: An ancient, seductive evil visits a painter. With our last short story, we come across something that shows even with a small budget of around $100.00 you can still make an interesting film. Unfortunately “interesting” doesn’t mean great. While the two leads do well in their roles, the overall segment feels pointless.

Hi-Death is neat for the fact that it allows indie horror film writers a chance to get their vision onto film. While there are some good examples of strong writing and one stand out performance, it isn’t enough to elevate the film above the bottom of the barrel anthologies already saturating the market.