Death Row is not exactly
what you’d call a tony period piece. Shocking, I know, given its genteel title,
and the co-starring presence of Jake Busey (let us now bow our heads for a
moment to observe the memory of Tomcats…), who now becomes notable as the whitest man
ever to play a character named Marco.
explore the bloody past of Isla del Roca Penetentiary, filmmakers Keith (Kyle
Schmid), Brian (Scott Whyte) blow off both a terrifying account from former
prison guard John Elias (Stacy Keach) and a mysterious warming from a priest
(Danny Trejo), and descend upon the aforementioned abandoned detention center with
their production team to begin shooting a documentary. Once inside, the crew
finds that a gang of fugitives from a nearby robbery gone awry have taken
refuge within the prison grounds. Shortly after their discovery, even more mayhem
breaks out when the rampaging ghosts of dead prisoners begin killing their new
guests. With filmmakers and fugitives locked together in a struggle for corporeal
survival against the continued existence of, I guess, the souls of their ghostly
antagonists, much blood naturally flows… which is to say in all sorts of unnatural
ways.
frequently lazy) hook ever since The
Blair Witch Project hit big back in 1999. Death Row doesn’t really score any points as far as imaginative
handling or integration of that tidbit, but railing against the set-up of a
movie like this is rather pointless. It’s not necessarily superbly acted, either, and some of the ways in which scenes cut together is slapdash and grating. Where Death
Row does score decent marks, though, is in its manipulation of effects and gore. Penned
by Rick Glassman (976-EVIL 2: The Astral
Factor… man, how I’ve waited to type that) and directed by Kevin VanHook (Slayer), the film doles out the
requisite carnage and death in interesting enough fashion (there’s nice use
made of a license plate machine), tosses in a few lookers (Shanna Collins, Claire
Coffee and Jamie Mann, above) amidst all that aforementioned sausage, and keeps
things moving at a nice pace.
presented in a 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer with Dolby digital 5.1 or Dolby
digital 2.0 audio audio, Death Row comes
with a smattering of supplemental extras that enhance the disc’s worth as a
rental for those in the market for grimy, gory genre monkeyshines. Joined by actors
Mann and Whyte, VanHook kicks things off with an audio commentary track, full
of backslapping anecdotes about on-set problem-solving. VanHook also talks a
bit about the editing process, but says that since he helped hatch and pare
down the narrative with Glassman (he takes a story credit on the script), he found
himself having a clearer idea of the final product than on some of his other
films, something supported by the sole deleted scene included here. A fairly
standard, 11-minute making-of featurette includes interviews with cast and
crew, as well as some behind-the-scenes footage. A four-minute bit entitled License to Thrill focuses on the gory effects
work involved in the movie. A photo gallery, some conceptual art and trailers
for other forthcoming Anchor Bay DVDs round out the release. C (Movie) B- (Disc)