Reality TV as it is today could certainly use more KOLOBOS as the late 1990s slasher take on

“Wanted: freeloaders. Artist seeks five progressive-minded individuals for groundbreaking experimental film. Participants will share free lodging in a fully furnished home in the Mount Olympus resorts. If you’re willing to laugh, cry, love, hate, befriend, betray, and confess it all on VHS, I want you.” So says the personals ad that attracts an oddball assortment of contestants to audition for the kind of offer that make slasher-savvy readers think twice (and probably go along anyway): among them cocky fast food cashier Tina who fancies herself "The Voice of America," pretentious philosophy student Gary, obnoxious standup comedian Tom, scream queen Erica who wants to be taken seriously as an actress, and self-harming artist Kyra (Amy Weber, DANGEROUS SEDUCTRESS) who is recovering from a nervous breakdown. Although only three of the group seems truly self-absorbed and exhibitionistic enough for a reality show, the five are actually well-chosen to needle each other about their perceived character flaws, giving director Carl () quite a show in the control room; however, it is not long before they find themselves sealed inside the house and victimized by various deadly booby traps. Kyra starts seeing a faceless apparition, but is she suffering a mental relapse or is there someone else in the house with them?

Coming a few years after the popularity of MTV's THE REAL WORLD, KOLOBOS is not so much a pointed skewering of burgeoning reality TV trends – although who wouldn't like to see the contestants of BIG BROTHER fall victim to various mutilating booby traps – as just another attempt at a post-SCREAM recursive take on the slasher (Erica is making the other contestants sit through the SLAUGHTERHOUSE FACTOR quartet of films when the first victim bites it). After the Dario Argento-isms of the opening credits – with Hollywood arranger William Kidd aping Goblin's main theme for SUSPIRIA – and a frantic POV trek through a rainstorm, the film settles into the standard terrain with a twist that seems less novel to fans familiar with EFFECTS and ISLAND OF BLOOD. From then on, it's a lot of running around in the dark, pairing off or splitting up, with one death that recalls the tooth bashing of DEEP RED and another that calls to mind both the eye-puncturing of Lucio Fulci's ZOMBIES and the antler impalement of SILENT NIGHT, DEADLY NIGHT. Cinematographer Yoram Astrakhan is more prolific as a videographer of special features documentaries for various Hollywood product, but his celluloid work here is occasionally striking. Make-up effects artist Jason Collins (MIMIC) got his start crewing with both KNB Efx Group and under John Vulich (ANGEL: THE SERIES) while co-effects artist Elizabeth Villamarin (CLUB VAMPIRE) has more recently been make-up department head on a number of network television shows. The film was produced by Robert Altman's son Dana (CALIFORNIA DREAMING).

While the film had some sparse theatrical play, KOLOBOS reached much of its audience via VHS from York Entertainment in a cropped fullscreen transfer that was quite grainy and a later non-anamorphic DVD that was letterboxed and included a 5.1 track. Derived from a 2K scan of the original camera negative, Arrow's 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 1.85:1 widescreen transfer reveals that this film was always going to be look grainy, but its occasionally hyper-saturated colors and balance of light and shadow are much improved, and the gore effects seem more accomplished than they did on DVD for some reason. DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and LPCM 2.0 stereo tracks are included, with the discrete surround option giving the score some spread along with some whispers and an electronic whirring noises. Either track is a fine listen. Optional English SDH subtitles are included.

The audio commentary by co-writers and co-directors Daniel Liatowitsch and David Todd Ocvirk finds the pair in a good spirits but a little underprepared – referring to some of the supporting performers as "this actress" or not recalling who did the drawings in the film (even though they state that the question was posed a number of times on the IMDb message boards) and so forth – conceding that the score was inspired by SUSPIRIA (with Goblin on the temp track) and the film's deaths and visual inspired by Dario Argento and Lucio Fulci, and that they really did look at THE REAL WORLD and think "wouldn't it be nice to kill them?" They discuss how the low budget film came about from another script, the improvements to the script by their film school classmate and producer Nne Ebong, the luck they had when their principle investor was able to secure them the house in the film through a friend, the difficulty of explaining their concept for the reality bending aspects of the film to the editor, and comparing the Omaha crew to the Los Angeles one. They also reveal that they did a joint cameo in the dorm room scene mooning the camera.

A much more focused and informative discussion comes with "Real World Massacre: The Making of KOLOBOS" (22:09) with Liatowitsch, Ocvirk and Ebong (who was not available for the commentary session). They reveal that Liatowitsch and Ebong had written a road movie script that attracted investor Edward Taylor, but Los Angeles was experiencing an El Nino which made shooting outside difficult (although the rainy weather did allow them to shoot the prologue for this film) but Taylor was still interested if they could come up with another idea to shoot by the end of the year in Omaha where he lived part of the time. They also reveal that the reason for the framing scenes was not narrative cleverness or a sequel hook but because they discovered that the rough assembly ran just over an hour. The film was sold to York Entertainment direct to VHS and DVD in the states but was popular in other territories where it got theatrical play, with Liatowitsch suggesting the subtle approach of the concurrently-released THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT influenced how audiences looked upon their film as the opposite.

"Face to Faceless" (9:45) is interview with Faceless actor Ilia Volok (AIR FORCE ONE) who recalls take the role as a way to broaden his work and trying to humanize the character in order to play him. He also discusses his discomfort with the prosthetics. In "Slice & Dice: The Music of Kolobos" (8:36), composer William Kidd reveals that Ocvirk was a classmate who had helped him promote himself, and that he was offered the job of arranging and conducting the score for the animated version of THE KING AND I and a Universal Studios Florida attraction around the same time and was able to utilize musicians from those jobs on the score for KOLOBOS.