Product Details

• Actors: Thomas Arklie, Ian Williams, Tony Slattery, Dillie Keane, Jean Boht
• Directors: Peter Mackenzie Litten
• Writers: Peter Mackenzie Litten, Johnny Byrne, Paul McEvoy
• Format: Color, NTSC
• Rated: R (Restricted)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: First Run Features
• VHS Release Date: January 1, 1998
• Run Time: 101 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 2.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 6303982174
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #460,374 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars What?, October 14, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: To Die For (aka Heaven's a Drag) [VHS] (VHS Tape)

The only thing I have to say about this movie is that the sound quality is so poor that you can have the volume up all the way on your TV and still not understand what the people are saying. Putting that aside, the story itself is not very interesting either. The front of the video looks like it is a comedy, however this movie is not funny. The story, 2 lovers - they have an open relationship, one has AIDS and dies, He comes back as a ghost to haunt his lover, preventing him to have any more one night stands.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars see it--and then see for yourself why you might not want to see it, July 28, 2011

By 

Matthew G. Sherwin (last seen screaming at Amazon customer service) - See all my reviews
(TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: To Die For (DVD)

To Die For is a somewhat average movie, although I will admit it wasn't all *that* bad for an evening at home when I was rather tired and I didn't want to watch anything that would make me think too much! People are right--the film tries hard to be many things including funny, dramatic, tragic, deep, revealing and more. But, as many note, it really doesn't meet any of those goals. Yes, I can see that people cared about making a good little film and that's great; but this just doesn't work out very well. The acting was definitely less than convincing at times and the plot moves somewhat slower than it should near the beginning of the film although it picks up the pace and gets rolling much better after the first half or so. However, the musical score was fairly well done.

The film's two main characters are Simon (Thomas Arklie), a TV repairman and Mark (Ian Williams), a drag performer who is dying of AIDS. Simon and Mark are lovers although their relationship is sexually open; and Simon seems to take advantage of that quite a lot. After Mark dies, Simon wants nothing more than to forget about Mark, repressing his true feelings of love and affection for Mark who was actually very special to him. Trouble is, however, Mark's ghost just won't go upward into heaven until Simon comes around and gets in touch with his feelings to finally mourn his great loss.

Of course, there are a few complications to spice the film up; but they don't really achieve that goal, either. What can I say? It's a mediocre film, after all. Simon must contend with a very homophobic TV repairman partner ("Dogger," played by John Altman); and Simon also has issues regarding his late father. Mark's ghost also causes trouble for Simon when Simon can see and talk to him--but all the others see and hear is nothing!

Look for Dillie Keane playing the role of their neighbor Siobban; and Tony Slattery does some of the better acting in the film as Terry, Siobban's boyfriend. Ian Williams as Mark's ghost does his best acting in the last major sequence of the film.

The DVD comes with an explanation of how the film essentially has two names--the original was To Die For but they had to change it to Heaven's a Drag after Sony told them they couldn't use that name; Sony was releasing their own film under that name at the same time.

Overall, if you just want some light entertainment that doesn't require you to think, watch this movie and get at least some enjoyment out of it. People seeking true drama with wit and deep emotion will want to keep on looking.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A bad movie I highly recommend, May 22, 2009

By 

J. Martin (Upstate New York USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: To Die For (DVD)

I'm going to do something I've never done before--give a good rating to a movie that's so bad I could hardly watch 95% of it. That's because there are three very peripheral things about this movie that I like so much they go a long way toward compensating for the mess it is in general.

Just about every negative comment about this movie in other reviews is true. It's a muddled mess that doesn't know what it wants to be, trying at various times to be funny, touching, topical, sexy, tragic and transcendent, and succeeding at none of them. It doesn't even know what its title is. In the opening credits, it's called Heaven's a Drag; in the end credits and on the DVD, it's called To Die For. (It was released the year before Gus Van Sant's much more famous and completely unrelated To Die For, starring Nicole Kidman, so the title wasn't stolen; the same title had been used for a Dracula movie several years before either of these movies was made anyway.) Ordinarily this movie wouldn't deserve more than a couple of stars at most. But now for the good stuff, the three things that together move me to praise it despite its very serious flaws.

First of all, this movie has a huge heart. Practically nobody involved seems to have any talent at all. Everything a good movie needs--competent screenplay, direction, cinematography, acting, etc--is lacking. But its good intentions are as pure and true and clear as its execution is muddled. A lot of people cared a lot about this movie, and it shows. I don't know HOW it shows, but it does. I've never before rewarded good intentions alone in reviewing a movie, and I might not in this case either if the next two factors weren't working in its favor too.

Second, there's something very appealing and attractive about Ian Williams, who plays the drag performer Mark. His performance in this movie isn't much better than anything else about it, but the man himself is unusual and unusually interesting. His speaking voice, for one thing, is lovely.

Third (and I've saved the best for last) is Ruth Wallis's fabulous song "Queer Things (are happening to me)." The song plays during the opening credits and carries into the first two scenes, where Mark is preparing for and then doing his drag performance to it. (Another reviewer ridiculed the fact that this evidently is the only song Mark knows, but it's good enough to carry several whole drag careers single-handed, if you ask me).

I'd never heard this song before, and I'd never heard of Ruth Wallis, but it and she are a joy, and Williams's act accompanying it is superb. I must have watched the first two and a half minutes of the movie 20 or 30 times just for the delight of hearing the song and watching his act, and I haven't come close to being tired of it yet.

So for its big heart, for Ian Williams's personal charm, and most of all for "Queer Things," I heartily recommend watching the first two and a half minutes of this movie. That's not much, but it's well worth it.