Tell Me How I Die
| Tell Me How I Die | |
|---|---|
 Film poster | |
| Directed by | D.J. Viola |
| Written by |
|
| Starring | |
Production companies |
|
Release date |
|
Running time | 107 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Tell Me How I Die is a 2016 American horror B movie directed by D.J. Viola. The film follows a group of young adults who enter a clinical trial for a memory-enhancing drug that allows them to have visions of the future. When a previous trial participant threatens the livelihoods of the participants and the doctors involved in the current trial, five participants struggle to find a way out of the facility alive.
Plot
 | This article's plot summary may be too long or excessively detailed. (May 2020) |
The film opens with a man looking at drawings. After taking a knife from the kitchen, he heads outside and stabs himself. One of the drawings is revealed to say "Kill yourself or I kill them all."
Dr. Layton (Mark Rolston) gives a speech onstage and introduces the concept of A9913, a memory-enhancing drug created by Hallorann Pharmaceuticals. The drug is able to give individuals full memory recall, allowing them to fully relive their past memories. After his speech, he meet with Dr. Jerrems (William Mapother), who has been working on the A9913 drug. Jerrems reports on the progress of the drug, but Layton laments over the lack of human clinical trials. Jerrems reassures Layton that the study will be ready for the FDA after the next set of clinical trials.
Anna (Virginia Gardner), a college student, visits her old place of employment in hopes of finding a new job. Den (Nathan Kress) asks the bartender to call a cab after helping a drunk girl, and catches Anna's eye. After Den leaves to check on the girl, the bartender tells Anna about an opportunity to take part in a clinical trial. She is accepted into the study and drives to the building where the trial is taking place, but arrives late.
Eighteen young adults, including Anna and Den, have been recruited to take part in the study, which is led by Dr. Jerrems. He informs them that it is a Phase 3 clinical trial for A9913 and that all of the participants will be residing in the building until the trial is complete. A second researcher, Curtis (Christopher Allen), gives them a tour of their living quarters after confiscating their cell phones.
Anna is introduced to Kristen (Kirby Bliss Blanton), who reveals that she decided to take part in the study after her father cut off her allowance. After Kristen is called to take the drug, Anna begins talking with Scratch (Ryan Higa), a participant who has volunteered for previous Hallorann clinical trials. Dr. Jerrems watches the participants from behind a glass wall, and is informed that Dr. Rasmussen, one of the co-researchers, is still unable to be reached.
When Anna displays some hesitation, Dr. Jerrems reminds her that she will be unable to leave the building after receiving the drug. He also reveals that the drug lasts for approximately six to eight hours. She ultimately decides to participate in the study.
Later, Marcus (Mark Furze) tries to invite Anna to play a round of pool with him by flirting with her. Den offers to play instead. The drugs begin to take effect in Marcus during the last round, when he accuses Den of moving the balls back to their previous position. Curtis enters and takes Marcus to see Dr. Jerrems, who asks Marcus to describe what happened during the pool game.
The drugs take effect in Kristen next, who sees herself talking with another participant about Curtis and then walking to the bathroom. She is shocked when the events begin to play out in the present, and is brought to see Dr. Jerrems.
Kristen later talks about her experience with Anna, Den, Marcus, and Scratch, likening it to déjà vu. Everyone else, including Marcus, denies that they have experienced anything. Scratch suggests that Kristen is remembering the future, since time is not linear. Anna tells Den that she plans to leave the facility the next morning, as the study was not what she expected.
Dr. Jerrems receives a call from Dr. Layton and is told that Dr. Rasmussen (Matthew Skomo) was found dead. He is revealed to have been the man at the beginning of the film. Dr. Jerrems finds a copy of the drawing that Rasmussen had with him when he died.
During the night, Anna goes to the bathroom, but hears a scream and runs back. She finds that the door to the bedroom is locked, and watches as the girls inside cough and begin to die. The window next to the door is painted with blood and reads the numbers 5260. However, it is revealed that nothing happened when Anna finds herself in the bathroom again. She rushes back to the bedroom to find the girls sleeping, alive. She grabs her personal belongings and attempts to leave the facility. While banging on one of the windows, she attracts the attention of Curtis and wakes up the other participants. She reveals that she saw everyone die in her vision. Den attempts to intervene, but Curtis injects Anna with a sedative and brings her to Dr. Jerrems.
Dr. Jerrems explains that Anna is experiencing a rare side effect of the drug. He leaves her strapped to a gurney while the effects of the drug wear off.
At the front of the building, the security guard (Wayne Alon Scott) sees something outside and goes to investigate. He steps on something a bear trap that was hidden in the snow. While attempting to crawl his way to safety, his head falls on a second bear trap, and he dies.
Marcus and Kristen invite Den to leave the facility with them. He agrees to come with. As they wander down a hallway, the lights turn from red to blue. They manage to find their way to the other side of the glass that walls in their living quarters. Kristen realizes that they have been watched the entire time. Curtis, who is inside the living quarters, falls against the glass and leaves a smear of blood on it. Den and Marcus struggle to keep a door closed when somebody tries to get through. The trio then leave and manage to find their way out of the building. Scratch finds them as they leave the building.
Anna has a vision of freeing herself from her restraints. She has another of being injected by Dr. Jerrems, as well as of Marcus laying dead on the floor.
Marcus, Kristen, Den, and Scratch reconvene in a car in the parking lot. Den tries to convince them not to leave without the rest of the participants. Den and Marcus return to the building to find Anna. Kristen joins them after Scratch attempts to flirt with her. While in the lobby, Kristen notices a strange smell. The sleeping participants begin to awaken after hearing noises and smelling something coming from the vents. They begin to cough violently, as Anna previously saw in her vision.
Den breaks off to find Anna while Marcus and Kristen continue to the sixth floor to save the other participants. Anna manages to break free from her restraints and finds her way to the bathroom. She hears screams coming from the bedroom and rushes to it, but is unable to enter it. Marcus, Kristen, and Den find Anna and inform her that mustard gas had gone through the vents.
Kristen goes to the bathroom. When she hears somebody in the bathroom with her, she hides herself in the laundry chute and gets caught in the barbed wire that lines it. A body falls down the chute behind her. Anna, Den, and Marcus hear her screams and attempt to find the other end of the laundry chute. They find the laundry room, but discover that Kristen is not there. They hypothesize that it was trap, and that whoever killed Curtis also took Kristen. Den thinks that a participant from a previous study, who has taken the drug before, is responsible. Anna has another vision and the trio return to the lobby. They find that the doors leading outside are locked. They realize that someone is turning off the security cameras that feed into the lobby's computers. Den proposes that they find Dr. Jerrems.
Dr. Layton makes a phone call requesting that someone check in on the Hallorann facility. Scratch gets tired of waiting in the car, and finds an entrance into the building through a garage door that is not completely shut. He finds a drawing of himself with hands around his neck.
Anna, Den, and Marcus find Dr. Jerrems office. A video of Dr. Rasmussen and Dr. Jerrems from six months ago begins playing on the computer, in which they are questioning a man named Pascal (Ethan Peck) about the significance of the name "Den." Anna and Marcus realize that the bloody numbers were not "5260," but "5 2 GO," as Anna, Den, Kristen, Marcus, Scratch were the last five people alive when the mustard gas killed the others. Scratch manages to get in touch with Anna, Den, and Marcus, and tells them about a biohazard room that they may be able to hide in. Anna tells Den and Marcus about her earlier visions, but denies knowing how she is going to die. In the garage, Scratch mixes together several vials of drugs, including A9913, and injects himself.
Anna reveals that she saw Den drowning to death. She also informs Marcus that he dies in a hallway. They continue to look for the shelter that Scratch mentioned, and Anna has another short vision. They reach a locked door and find Dr. Jerrems behind it, but he refuses to let them in. Den questions Dr. Jerrems about Pascal. Dr. Jerrems tells them that Pascal was the first participant to have visions, and as such he was used to test new variations of the A9913 drug. The drug was revealed to have a cumulative effect, and Pascal eventually began to stop experiencing time as linear. He later experienced a psychiatric break. Den confirms that Pascal is killing the participants in order to force Dr. Jerrems into committing suicide.
Scratch finds the keys to a motorcycle but is unable to start it. He collects a pot in order to siphon gas from the car, but as he walks to the car he has a vision of himself being stabbed. He has another vision of himself walking back to the garage, in which he is also stabbed. He decides to re-enter the garage, but is attacked by someone. He runs to the car and is stabbed like his vision predicted.
Marcus questions Dr. Jerrems about what would happen if Pascal was killed. Anna wonders why Den decided to come back for her. Marcus realizes that Pascal is likely to kill everyone in order to erase all traces of the drug. He proposes that they tie Anna up, as he doesn't believe that her visions will come true if she can't see them happening. They begin to hear banging on the door above them and try to find a way out. When Dr. Jerrems continues to refuse to let them into the room he's locked in, Marcus grabs a metal pipe and hits Anna with it. Den attacks Marcus in retaliation. Marcus stabs himself during the fight and dies.
Anna and Den make it to the roof of the building. Den assures Anna that they will be able to fall into the snowbank below, and kisses her. He counts them down, then pushes her off the building. She lands in the snowbank, alive. Den tells her to go to the car and try to find help. Inside the car, she finds Scratch's body and the vial of A9913 drug. When she turns on the headlights, she sees Kristen's frozen body in front of the car and realizes that her earlier vision of Kristen dying in the bathroom was wrong. She drives the car through the building and confronts Dr. Jerrems about the discrepancy. She argues that the visions are not fate, but merely self-fulfilling prophecies, which Dr. Jerrems agrees with. She then injects herself with the A9913 drug that Scratch had in his possession.
Inside the building, Den breaks a mop in half and tries to find Pascal. He finds him by the pool and attempts to attack him with the stick. When Anna arrives, Pascal has a vision of throwing Den into the pool, fighting Anna, and killing Den. When the vision ends, he decides to stab Den prior to throwing him into the pool. Anna pulls Den from the water while Pascal leaves.
Dr. Layton arrives at the facility and unlocks the door to the room that Dr. Jerrems has been hiding in. Dr. Jerrems notices liquid on the floor while Dr. Layton is yelling at him. Dr. Layton drops his cigar on the floor, and they watch as the room goes up in flames and Pascal walks away.
Anna and Den make it outside, where Pascal is watching them from the roof. She attempts to comfort Den while sirens blare in the background.
Cast
- Nathan Kress as Den Ferguson
- Virginia Gardner as Anna Nichols
- Kirby Bliss Blanton as Kristen
- Ryan Higa as Scratch
- Mark Furze as Marcus
- Ethan Peck as Pascal
- Mark Rolston as Dr. Layton
- William Mapother as Dr. Jerrems
- Christopher Allen as Curtis
Production
Filming took place in Los Angeles, California.
Release
The film was released online on September 16, 2016 in the United States.
Reception
The film was panned by critics.[1][2]
References
- ^ "'Tell Me How I Die': Film Review". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 2020-05-25.
- ^ "Review: With horror flick 'Tell Me How I Die,' it will likely be from boredom". Los Angeles Times. 2016-09-01. Retrieved 2020-05-25.