High LifeMovies like High Life
- Key Features:
- Drug addiction, Ex-convicts, Crime, Heist, 1980s, Culture clash, Black comedy, Misfit characters, Nudity-moderate, Drug use-high
- Tone:
- cynical, gritty, humorous
- Target Audience:
- Crime comedy fans, Indie film enthusiasts, Cynical viewers
- Emotional Arc:
- Amusement → Tension
High Life

It's 1983, and hopeless junkie Dick gets an unwelcome visit from the past - his seriously sleazy former cellmate, Bug, to be precise. Bug requires a crash course in the 80s: different music, different drugs, and machines in walls that dispense money. The latter development gives Dick an idea.
High Life
Over the course of three days Ross, a college dropout addicted to crystal-meth, encounters a variety of oddball folks - including a stripper named Nikki and her boyfriend, the local meth producer, The Cook - but all he really wants to do is hook up with his old girlfriend, Amy.

The sordid lives of an addict, an ex-con, and a luchador collide when an organ harvesting caper goes very, very wrong.

After a friend overdoses, Spoon and Stretch decide to kick their drug habits and attempt to enroll in a government detox program. Their efforts are hampered by seemingly endless red tape, as they are shuffled from one office to another while being chased by drug dealers and the police.

The boys get arrested for robbing an ATM machine and spend 18 months in jail, upon release they decide to pull off "The Big Dirty", a plan to steal a large amount of coins because they are untraceable and quit their life of crime forever.

A bigoted junkie cop suffering from borderline personality disorder and drug addiction manipulates and hallucinates his way in a bid to secure promotion.

Lenny Brown moves to California to find his fortune in tax shelter investments. When the federal government changes the tax laws, poor Lenny finds himself $700,000 in hock with nowhere to turn. His friend, Joel, introduces him to cocaine to give Lenny that needed "boost". What ensues next is a descent into drug addiction and insanity as Lenny tries to regain control of his life, all the while needing that extra "boost".

Eighties teen romp involving Bill and his new apartment, Jim and his rebellious antics, Tom and his crazy self, and Anita with her older man David.

Chelios faces a Chinese mobster who has stolen his nearly indestructible heart and replaced it with a battery-powered ticker that requires regular jolts of electricity to keep working.

Brian comes under the addictive spell of a parasite with the ability to induce euphoric hallucinations in its hosts.

When an upwardly mobile couple find themselves unemployed and in debt, they turn to armed robbery in desperation.

After Dick Harper loses his job at Globodyne in an Enron-esque collapse, he and his wife, Jane, turn to crime in order to handle the massive debt they now face. Two intelligent people, Dick and Jane actually get pretty good at robbing people and even enjoy it -- but they have second thoughts when they're reminded that crime can hurt innocent people. When the couple hears that Globodyne boss Jack McCallister actually swindled the company, they plot revenge.

Unless Darren can survive New York's largest drug mogul, write a paper on Dante's "Inferno," escape three thugs chasing the wrong guy and sell fifty pills of ecstasy to make his tuition payment, he'll never date the girl of his dreams.

A college freshman returns to Los Angeles for Christmas at his ex-girlfriend's request, but discovers that his former best friend has an out-of-control drug habit.

Raoul Duke and his attorney Dr. Gonzo drive a red convertible across the Mojave desert to Las Vegas with a suitcase full of drugs to cover a motorcycle race. As their consumption of drugs increases at an alarming rate, the stoned duo trash their hotel room and fear legal repercussions. Duke begins to drive back to L.A., but after an odd run-in with a cop, he returns to Sin City and continues his wild drug binge.

Dexter and Royce, two stoners in the small town of Weedsville, attempt to cover up the overdose of Royce's girlfriend Matilda. What leads from an old drive-in being perfect place to ditch her turns into the accidental discovery of a Satanic cult, who brings Mattie back from the dead after their ritual is botched. Along with the two's dealer Omar on their tail, how will these buddies and their slightly-off lady-on-board deal with the dangers of drug debt and demon-worshipping magic?

Two common criminals get more than they bargained for after kidnapping the wife of a corrupt real-estate developer who shows no interest in paying the $1 million dollar ransom for her safe return.

A supermarket clerk decides to step in for an absent drug dealer, setting off an explosive, comedic chain of events.

Heroin addict Mark Renton stumbles through bad ideas and sobriety attempts with his unreliable friends --Sick Boy, Begbie, Spud and Tommy. He also has an underage girlfriend, Diane, along for the ride. After cleaning up and moving from Edinburgh to London, Mark finds he can't escape the life he left behind as Begbie and Sick Boy come knocking.

Marcus and Mike are forced to confront new threats, career changes, and midlife crises as they join the newly created elite team AMMO of the Miami police department to take down the ruthless Armando Armas, the vicious leader of a Miami drug cartel.

A boy named George Jung grows up in a struggling family in the 1950's. His mother nags at her husband as he is trying to make a living for the family. It is finally revealed that George's father cannot make a living and the family goes bankrupt. George does not want the same thing to happen to him, and his friend Tuna, in the 1960's, suggests that he deal marijuana. He is a big hit in California in the 1960's, yet he goes to jail, where he finds out about the wonders of cocaine. As a result, when released, he gets rich by bringing cocaine to America. However, he soon pays the price.

A high school valedictorian who gets baked with the local stoner finds himself the subject of a drug test. The situation causes him to concoct an ambitious plan to get his entire graduating class to face the same fate, and fail.

Utah and his girlfriend Opal, are drug addicts living on the streets in rural Ohio. After getting recruited by body broker Wood and offered treatment in Los Angeles, Wood takes Utah under his wing and introduces him to treatment center mogul Vin. Wood and Vin bring Utah in on their lucrative and illegal dealings, where saving lives comes second to the bottom line.

Sometime in the future, mankind has depleted all energy and fuel sources, however they have engineered a way to use human excrement as fuel. To reward production, the government hands out extremely addictive, popsicle-like "Juicybars", which in turn also act as a laxative. Aachi and Ssipak are street hoodlums who struggle to survive by trading these bars in the black market.

To inherit his mother-in-law's colossal fortune, a hard living gambling addict must change his unhealthy ways before it gets the best of him.

Two college roommates venture out to identify a fellow student, who is most likely to commit suicide as it will help them pass the semester.

An entrepreneurial criminal, Slim (Dorff) is as smart as they come. Cocky and confident, he assembles a team of risk-taking rush-seekers to pull off a series of five bank heists, each time using a different extreme sport to make the getaway. Following an unexpected windfall on only their second job, the gang nets $20 million in untraceable bonds. Having scored enough money to retire on, Slim and his crew decide to call the robbery game quits. But both the mob and the police have other plans in mind for Slim: they want him to keep working, for them.

Three converging story lines involving bootleggers, a serial killer and drug dealers are followed. A former drug dealer tries to go straight, but comes across a stash of stolen drugs. Meanwhile, a middle-aged suburban housewife hides a sadistic and vicious streak.

Four friends become stranded in Eastern Europe and have to become hit men, prostitutes, corrupt cops, smugglers and more to make it home.

After a psychic predicts his death, a small-time hoodlum named Julian hires a cheap documentary film crew to document the last few days of his mis-spent life. This is the film that pioneered the show of the same name.

A father and his daughter struggle to survive in deep space where they live in isolation.

To escape his life of crime, a Paris drug dealer takes on one last job involving Spain, unhinged gangsters, his longtime crush and his scheming mother.

A broke mechanic turns a bank loan denial into an impromptu robbery that puts him on the run with his best friend and a starlet they hold hostage.

Five bored, occasionally high and always ineffective Vermont state troopers must prove their worth to the governor or lose their jobs. After stumbling on a drug ring, they plan to make a bust, but a rival police force is out to steal the glory.

Sweet suburban teen Amanda is introduced by her new friends to prescription drug-sharing, but the recreational fun soon leads her to a life-altering heroin addiction.

In the hope of a big score, two junkie couples team up to commit various drug robberies which go disastrously wrong, leading to dissent, violence, and murder.

Join uptight David Starsky and laid-back Ken "Hutch" Hutchinson as they're paired for the first time as undercover cops. The new partners must overcome their differences to solve an important case with help from street informant Huggy Bear and persuasive criminal Reese Feldman.

When two jobless friends discover a hidden weed bible and the ultimate bud, they think that they’ve got it made…with 'seed' money to start a new snack delivery app. But, when nearly all of their stash and weed bible are stolen, the two potpreneurs set off on an outrageous, mind-bending adventure through Atlanta to find them. Stoned with supernatural powers, they search 'high' and low, stopping at nothing to recover their ticket to starting a legit business.

A DEA agent provides former Marine Tim Kearney with a way out of his prison sentence: impersonate Bobby Z, a recently deceased drug dealer, in a hostage switch with a crime lord. When the negotiations go awry, Kearney flees, with Z's son in tow.

Friends hatch a plot to retrieve a stolen cat by posing as drug dealers for a street gang.

A hippie radical, Huey Walker has been a fugitive for decades, accused of a crime that he may not have committed. Finally apprehended, Walker is escorted to trial by uptight 20-something FBI agent John Buckner. While the two seem to be polar opposites, it turns out that Buckner may have more in common with Walker than is initially apparent, a point that is driven home when the pair faces off against a sinister small-town sheriff.

A New York DEA agent springs an outlaw from jail to lead him to stolen money in South America.

Unscrupulous boxing promoters, violent bookies, a Russian gangster, incompetent amateur robbers, and supposedly Jewish jewellers fight to track down a priceless stolen diamond.

Craig and Smokey are two guys in Los Angeles hanging out on their porch on a Friday afternoon, smoking and drinking, looking for something to do.

A young pickpocket in the New York subways, living a fast, free, lifestyle is confronted by a woman whom he had a one night affair with, she informs him that she is now pregnant with his child, he must now choose between continuing the lifestyle he lead or take responsibility for his actions.

Sam and Fordy run a credit card fraud scheme, but when they steal from the wrong man, they find themselves threatened by sadistic gangster. They need to raise £5m and pull off a daring diamond heist to clear their debt.

Driven by biological excess, a young man and woman search for sexual fulfillment, unaware of each other's existence. Unfortunately, they eventually meet, and the bonding of these two very unusual human beings ends in an explosive and ultimately over-the-top sexual experience, resulting in a truly god awful love story....

A poet falls in love with an art student, who gravitates to his bohemian lifestyle — and his love of heroin. Hooked as much on one another as they are on the drug, their relationship alternates between states of oblivion, self-destruction, and despair.

Landing in jail for a petty theft crime, Alvin finds himself sharing a cell with John Jaster, the incarcerated half of the pair of high-tech thieves responsible for the missing gold. His partner, Bristol, is still at large. Alvin wants only to get out of prison and start fresh with his girlfriend, Lisa, and when the Feds, led by U.S. Treasury investigator Clenteen, set him loose on a sketchy deal, he thinks his luck has changed. Alvin has his freedom and the Feds have found their bait.

A straight-laced pharmacist's uneventful life spirals out of control when he starts an affair with a trophy wife customer who takes him on a joyride involving sex, drugs and possibly murder.

A young man turns from drug addiction and petty crime to a life redeemed by a discovery of compassion.

Recently fired and facing eviction, a new dad has his life turned upside down when he meets a wealthy couple who offer a path to financial security... but at a price.

Portland, Oregon, 1971. Bob Hughes is the charismatic leader of a peculiar quartet, formed by his wife, Dianne, and another couple, Rick and Nadine, who skillfully steal from drugstores and hospital medicine cabinets in order to appease their insatiable need for drugs. But neither fun nor luck last forever.

Three lovable party buds try to bail their friend out of jail. But just when the guys have mastered a plan, everything comes dangerously close to going up in smoke.

A depressed white-collar worker tries hypnotherapy, only to find himself in a perpetual state of devil-may-care bliss that prompts him to start living by his own rules, and hatch a hapless attempt to embezzle money from his soul-killing employers.

A former Los Angeles drug dealer moves far away to Texas, making a new life for himself as a married architect in the suburbs. His old crime partner unexpectedly shows up with heroin and gangster business, attracting a slew of violent unsavory characters.

Sang-hoon is a lowlife gangster, a debt collector exercising thuggish ways to collect his money. The recipient of nothing but anger since his childhood, he expresses himself through violence. When he finally encounters someone who can stand up to him, feisty school-girl Yoon-hee they become unlikely friends.

A hard-luck limo driver struggling to go straight and pay off a debt to his bookie takes on a job with a crazed passenger whose sought-after ledger implicates some seriously dangerous criminals.

A stoner and his dealer are forced to go on the run from the police after the pothead witnesses a cop commit a murder.

Multi-platinum rap superstars Redman and Method Man star as Jamal and Silas, two regular guys who smoke something magical, ace their college entrance exams and wind up at Harvard. Ivy League ways are strange but Silas and Jamal take it in a stride -- until their supply of supernatural smoke runs dry. That's when they have to start living by their wits and rely on their natural resources to make the grade.

Poker addict Mike McDermott knows the game inside out, but loses his money one night in a game to Russian-American gangster Teddy KGB. Promising his partner Jo he'll give up, he meets up with best friend Lester 'Worm' Murphy, just out of prison and owing lots of money to the wrong kind of people. McDermott becomes his co-guarantor and now there's only one way to raise the money, the pair have to get back into the game.

A professional thief with $40 million in debt and his family's life on the line must commit one final heist - rob a futuristic airborne casino filled with the world's most dangerous criminals.

A family man convicted of killing an intruder must cope with life afterward in the violent penal system.

Carefree single guy Charlie Waters rooms with two lovely prostitutes, Barbara Miller and Susan Peters, and lives to gamble. Along with his glum betting buddy, Bill Denny, Charlie sets out on a gambling streak in search of the ever-elusive big payday. While Charlie and Bill have some lucky moments, they also have to contend with serious setbacks that threaten to derail their hedonistic betting binge.

After being released on parole, a burglar attempts to go straight, get a regular job, and just go by the rules. He soon finds himself back in jail at the hands of a power-hungry parole officer.

In the near future, Frank, a police officer, discovers that the legalization of all recreational drugs comes with a price.

A retired pool hustler is forced to pick up the stick again when his brother starts a game he can't finish.

Police officer Tom Sharky gets busted back to working vice, where he happens upon a scandalous conspiracy involving a local politician. Sharky's new 'machine' gathers evidence while Sharky falls in love with a woman he has never met.

Sergei and Simon have to deliver a suitcase full of heroin to Mikhalych or else they will be killed. There is one minor detail: the only problem-solving technique they are familiar with is a shot in the head.

In Paris, two dysfunctional dealers use family ties to try to boost their small drug business in this crass comedy based on the webseries.

A prequel to the critically acclaimed series featuring Jerri Blank, a 46 year old ex-junkie, ex-con who returns to high school in a bid to start her life over.

When a Las Vegas bodyguard with lethal skills and a gambling problem gets in trouble with the mob, he has one last play… and it's all or nothing.

When Syd, a young editor at an influential art magazine, becomes involved with her neighbor, a drug-addicted lesbian photographer, both seek to exploit each other for their respective careers while slowly falling in love with each other.

Blank-faced bug killer Bill Lee and his dead-eyed wife, Joan, like to get high on Bill's pest poisons while lounging with Beat poet pals. After meeting the devilish Dr. Benway, Bill gets a drug made from a centipede. Upon indulging, he accidentally kills Joan, takes orders from his typewriter-turned-cockroach, ends up in a constantly mutating Mediterranean city and learns that his hip friends have published his work -- which he doesn't remember writing.

When a drug heist swerves lethally out of control, a jaded cop fights his way through a corrupt city's criminal underworld to save a politician's son.

An unemployed pot-smoking slacker and amateur drummer, Anthony Stoner ditches his strict parents and hits the road, eventually meeting kindred spirit Pedro de Pacas. While the drug-ingesting duo is soon arrested for possession of marijuana, Anthony and Pedro get released on a technicality, allowing them to continue their many misadventures and ultimately compete in a rock band contest, where they perform the raucous tune "Earache My Eye."

A man goes undercover in a hi-tech prison to find out information to help prosecute those who killed his wife. While there, he stumbles onto a plot involving a death-row inmate and his $200 million stash of gold.

For Jip, Lulu, Koop, Nina and Moff, the dead-end jobs they endure during the week just kill the time until Friday night. That's when they cut very loose and get on the rollercoaster ride that takes them right through to Monday morning.

In the not-so-distant future, all drinking and drugs have been made completely illegal by the government, except for one night a year. High school seniors Griffin, Hags, and Andrew make a pilgrimage to get to the best party in town where all their dreams will come true. They will have to avoid their crazed principal, violent siblings, and the wild animals roaming the streets.

Suburbanite Ron is spoiled, young and not overly worried about the marijuana charges leveled against him. But, after being made out to be a drug dealer, he faces a five-year jail sentence in San Quentin State Prison. Physically frail and unaccustomed to his rough surroundings, Ron is primed to fall victim to sexual predators and bullying guards – that is, until he's befriended by Earl, a veteran inmate who finds meaning in protecting the vulnerable new kid.

Jack is caught with the wife of his employer, a Vegas thug. The thug sends goons after Jack, who convinces his best friend, Pilot, to flee with him. Pilot insists that they head for Seattle, but doesn't tell Jack why. The goons learn from Pilot's drug source where the youths are headed, and they follow, hell bent on breaking Jack's feet. On the road, Jack and Pilot give a ride to Cassie, a distressed young woman. She and Jack hit it off. They pick up an aging stoner headed to Seattle for Kurt Cobain's memorial, and they help a circus sideshow family. Why is Pilot so set on Seattle, will the goons catch Jack, and is there any way the friends' competing needs can be resolved?

A group of physically disabled lowlifes plots the the perfect heist, but things go south as each reveals an agenda of their own.

Three stories about the world of opioids collide: a drug trafficker arranges a multi-cartel Fentanyl smuggling operation between Canada and the U.S., an architect recovering from an OxyContin addiction tracks down the truth behind her son's involvement with narcotics, and a university professor battles unexpected revelations about his research employer, a drug company with deep government influence bringing a new "non-addictive" painkiller to market.

A deranged prison warden with a nasty habit of killing escapees forces the boyfriends of his teenage twin daughters into a shotgun wedding, after they claim to be pregnant. All hope seems lost, until the husbands hatch a madcap plan to rob a money train to freedom.

Career criminal Youngblood Priest wants out of the Atlanta drug scene, but as he ramps up sales, one little slip up threatens to bring the whole operation down before he can make his exit.

Mick O'Brien is a young Chicago street thug torn between a life of petty crime and the love of his girlfriend. But when the heist of a local drug dealer goes tragically wrong Mick is sentenced to a brutal juvenile prison where violence is a rite of passage and respect is measured in vengeance.

A young drug dealer watches as his high-rolling life is dismantled in the wake of his cousin's murder, which sees his best friend arrested for the crime.

A student creates and sells a drug called 'Z' which has the unexpected side effect of resurrecting the dead as flesh-eating zombies, who proceed to wreak havoc at a Halloween rave.

A gangster, Nino, is in the Cash Money Brothers, making a million dollars every week selling crack. A cop, Scotty, discovers that the only way to infiltrate the gang is to become a dealer himself.

The film starts in the 13th arrondissement of Paris in 1984. Robert Pinot is a police officer as ordinary as clumsy. One day, he stops a certain Josyane, a young drug addict who is also doubled as a pickpocket, nicknamed Marylou. Having discovered that she comes from the same village, Nanteuil, then him, he takes compassion for the young girl and decides to take her under his wing to keep her away from Tony, a dangerous dealer with whom she is in love.

Dealing with a sociopathic school bully, three high school freshmen hire a low-budget bodyguard to protect them, not realizing he is just a homeless beggar and petty thief looking for some easy cash.

After a botched bank robbery lands his younger brother in prison, Connie Nikas embarks on a twisted odyssey through New York City's underworld to get his brother Nick out of jail.

Inspired by actual events in the late nineties when Hasidic Jews were recruited as mules to smuggle ecstasy from Europe into the United States.

A tale of an inner city drug dealer who turns away from crime to pursue his passion, rap music.

After a group of young revolutionaries break into a company's corporate headquarters and steal $5,000,000 worth of heroin to keep it off the street, they call on San Francisco Police Lieutenant Virgil Tibbs for assistance.

Two corrupt cops in New Mexico set out to blackmail and frame every criminal unfortunate enough to cross their path. Things take a sinister turn, however, when they try to intimidate someone who is more dangerous than they are. Or is he?

A divorced dad and his ex-con brother resort to a desperate scheme in order to save their family's farm in West Texas.

Harry Doyle and Archie Lang are two old-time train robbers, who held up a train in 1956 and have been incarcerated for thirty years. After serving their time, they are released from jail and have to adjust to a new life of freedom. and soon realize that they still have the pizzazz when, picking up their prison checks at a bank, they foil a robbery attempt.

Angela and Jessie are best friends intent on taking a wild beach trip, but when their roommate loses all of their money in a drug scam, the girls -- blissfully stoned -- go to increasingly daring and absurd lengths to get it back.

