Death Row

2006 "An abandoned prison. A dark past. And an evil... that will not die."
3.7| 1h30m| en
Details

Haunted Prison - AKA Death Row - a horrifying live action film based on the short story by Kevin VanHook-takes place at Isla de la Roca Penitentiary. Rumor has it the Devil himself spat up the place out of the depths of hell, and man turned it into a prison for the most dangerous prisoners in the South. The monstrous building is steeped in the evil created by centuries of murder and injustice and is haunted by vengeful ghosts. Isla de la Roca was abandoned after being soaked in blood by a horrific massacre of inmates and guards. A gang of fugitives from a cop-killing robbery seek refuge within the razor wire of the prison walls at the same time as a documentary film crew arrives to tell the story of the penitentiary. When these groups cross paths within the cruel walls of Isla de la Roca, will anyone get out alive?

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Reviews

Curapedi I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.
Kaydan Christian A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.
Matylda Swan It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.
Geraldine The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.
Brandon Gregory Well, I personally have been a fan of the movie for quite some time now. I see a lot of negativity towards this film, it's just a tad bit depressing but hey, everyone is entitled to their own opinion. I first saw Death Row on Sci-Fi(SyFy)a few years ago, On the guide it was listed as ''HAUNTED PRISON'' (Therefor making it extremely hard to find to purchase on DVD because the DVD title is ''DEATH ROW'', haha.) Surely enough, I came to my senses and looked the film up on here(IMDb) and ordered it right away.In a nutshell, Death Row (AKA Haunted Prison) is about two groups of people, one group just robbed a bank but came to the prison due to things not going as planned, so they went to hide out. While the second group was only trying to get some film on the prison for the documentary about the place they are filming. Both soon see that there is a lot wrong with the place... The rest is for you to see.The movie ,in my opinion, was a very solid horror film ( especially for a STARZ production for Sci-Fi.) Jake Busey did a really good job with his roll, he made the whole movie and set the tone of the film. All of the other actors and actresses weren't really special to the film, but I give them all credit for making the film believable and working in 2 actual abandoned prisons for most of the film. One of the prisons had no electricity, so i could imagine the difficulties with that.The gore in the film is actually pretty good and hard to believe it turned out so well with the budget that it was made with. I must say, when Anibal gets chopped up in the license plate machine, the effex and camera angles are very impressive. The scene where John chops off his legs in the gas chamber was pretty intense too. The scene where Ron gets pushed through the fence was definitely an idea I've never seen that before in a movie, I liked it. The make-up effex are over the top. Favorably, with the nun that can be seen several times throughout the movie.Overall, I love this movie and i would recommend it to anyone who likes horror. It's very good to watch this movie with friends, especially with some drinks or pop-corn. Just have a good time and i hope you enjoy the movie as much as I do.
Michael O'Keefe A low budget horror flick from the Sci-Fi Channel. The special effects are much better than the story or acting. Dismembered bodies in pools of blood and ghosts that can only be seen when they want to be. An old rundown prison that once housed the most dangerous and ruthless criminals imagined grabs the interest of a film crew wanting to film a documentary. A group of jewelry thieves stumble upon the prison and decide to take refuge. So now there are two groups of people inside the prison and meet hellish ghosts of those who were tortured and died there.Kevin VanHook directs his own story and does well with what he has to work with. Cinematography provides the right atmosphere to set up some very graphic scenes. Starring are: Jake Busey, Kyle Schmidt, Claire Coffee, Denny Arroyo, Stacey Keach, Danny Trejo, and Abra Chouinard.
matrix359 This has got to be one of the worst horror films I have ever seen, and I have seen the original Evil Dead. The acting is horrible and the inconsistencies are rampant, and from start to finish the movie does not pull you in, it pushes you away. It is just not entertaining at all, I mean for instance the scene were Jasmine (played by the beautiful Jamie Elle Mann) was killed when a wooden ceiling fan chops her body in half is not even believable to a fifth grader. Whatever you do unless you like watching a complete waste of time, watch something else, pretty much anything else. I hope the sci-fi channel does not run this ever again.
Jack I've watched almost every Sci-Fi Original for the past several years, and I have to say this is probably the best one yet. It doesn't do any of the things that usually makes these movies suck: It doesn't have MTV-style editing, it has likable, sympathetic characters speaking believable, witty dialogue, it has effective theme music, the special effects are actually cool looking, and because of all those factors, I actually found it quite interesting - usually I'm groaning and rolling my eyes after about 15 minutes of one of these things.We start with Stacy Keach, and old prison guard who is now in a convalescent home, being interviewed by some kids who want to do a documentary on the prison he used to work at. He relates the story of how some guards went nuts and caused a prison riot, resulting in a whole lot of bloodshed. It's quite interesting because as he tells the tale, he was just about the only innocent prison guard, but as we see the flashbacks, he was actually the ring leader. Not only does Stacy do a great job, but the flashback scenes are fairly brutal and the whole thing just has a nasty feel to it. As the opening credits start to roll, we get one hell of a spooky version of "Itsy Bitsy Spider" as the theme music. It's interestingly effective.Now, on to the prison. A group of people have just robbed a jewelry store, and they're using the place as a hideout. These people are great, especially the ring leader. He starts out as somewhat of a normal guy, certainly not very nice but strangely charming in his total lack of empathy for his business partners. We've also got a hot babe (really, really hot), a wounded guy, and several other characters. All have believable, entertaining personalities. Shortly afterwards, our documentary kids show up, and then all the prison doors mysteriously close and lock. Hey, it's the "Haunted Prison". The kids are also pretty good characters, we don't get the annoyingly blatant clichés so common in these Sci-Fi Channel movies, nor do we get the cringe-inducing "what adults think kids act like" embarrassments; these folks could actually be real people. Okay, a couple of them are rather over-the-top in how horny they are, but it's kept short and fairly low-key.As the movie goes on, the jewel thieves start looking for a way to get out, coming tantalizingly close several times, while the kids eventually join up with them. This is all handled in a rather complex and credible manner as well. The characters are just so believable and entertaining, and the situation handled in such a plausible way (for a haunted prison movie), that I was kept interested throughout. There's some great and original gore in this thing, as one guy is run through a license plate stamping machine, and one of the girls gets chopped up by a ceiling fan. The ghosts inhabiting the prison are done quite well, appearing as if there's some extreme heat shimmer coming off of them. And then there's the scene where the hot babe gets drenched in some sort of icky fluid from some broken pipes, and strips down to her undies to take a shower. I don't know about you, but that was one of the sexiest scenes I've seen in a long, long time.The ending, well, it was a bit cheesy, but I'm happy to accept that considering how fun the rest of the movie was.Overall, it's just astonishing what a gigantic difference a little bit of TALENT can make when it comes to film making. Congratulations to the film makers - you did what most of us though impossible - you made a good Sci-Fi Channel original movie! Unfortunately it's almost a certainty that next week it will be back to the usual loads of bargain basement CGI, characters you're wishing would die in the most horrible ways, and enough MTV-style fast-editing to make you feel like you're watching a strobe light instead of a movie. Oh well, at least now we know there IS hope.