Murdercise

I thought we stopped making nonsense like this in the eighties.

Murdercise seems to have been made in backlots and unused offices by wannabe porn stars playing dress up and pretend.

Everything, and I do mean everything is awful.

The acting, awful. The direction, awful. The plot, awful. It seems very much like a film made during covid and that is not a compliment.

I usually don't like to give one star ratings to movies anymore because it takes a lot of effort to get an indie film made these days. But in this case, I will make an exception. It has a depressingly cheap and sleazy feel to the whole thing.

No date is given but the setting is obviously the wonderful 1980's. Within the first minute or so a busty babe has stripped off and is taking a shower, a few seconds later and she is murdered. The main plot has a group of attractive young women shooting a fitness video in a studio (on tape, naturally), our main girl Phoebe is all innocent but sleazy director Gino and his cameraman want more sex than exercise. "All those girls out there are strippers, perverts and communists!" exclaims Phoebe before she loses the plot and turns into a killer. But she's not alone, oh no - for good measure a pair of fake cops with a taste for sex and murder are thrown into the mix for (very) good measure. The slasher movie "Killer Workout" aka "Aerobicide" (1987) springs to mind. Murdercide, with its blue/purple lighting, mist machine, Walkman, sweatbands and VHS tapes etc is a very good homage to the 1980's. The budget was obviously low, some of the acting is "bad" but I'm sure that was intentional and some of the kills are pretty gory. The best one has a man have his head chainsawed in half. I went into this not expecting much but I'm pleased to say that I enjoyed it, pretty good fun and a movie that I'd probably want to watch again. Catchy soundtrack too.

Right, well I was lead to believe that I was in for a horror comedy, as I sat down to watch the 2023 movie "Murdercise". Sure, I had never heard about the movie prior to sitting down to watch it, so I didn't really know what I was getting into.

Turns out that writer Paul Ragsdale managed to come up with a complete dumpster fire of a movie. The storyline and script was so laughably bad that it was simply astounding. I will actually go as far as saying that the storyline in "Murdercise" is one of the dumbest I have sat through in a long, long time. It was supposed to be an homage to the campy and cheesy 1980s horror movies. But "Murdercise" never stood a chance. The narrative was rubbish and there was just nothing appealing or interesting about the ordeal.

I managed to suffer through a staggering 25 minutes of absolute rubbish and boredom in some of its purest form. Then I just couldn't take anymore of it, and turns off the movie. And trust me, this is not a movie that I will ever return to attempt finish watching. There literally was nothing worthwhile about this ordeal.

The acting performances in "Murdercise" were insanely amateurish, wooden, rigid and just awkwardly embarrassing to witness. Needless to say that there weren't anyone even remotely famous on the cast list. And with good reason, I might add. The majority of the women were cast for the movie for one reason, and it takes very little effort to figure out what that reason was.

"Murdercise" looked and felt like a homemade high school project of making a horror comedy. Well, except that the movie was lacking those two key elements; horror and comedy.

Do yourself a favor and stay well clear of directors Angelica De Alba and Paul Ragsdale's 2023 movie "Murdercise", it just simply isn't worth the time, money or effort.

My rating of "Murdercise" lands on a one out of ten stars.

I mean, this is bad. It is lovely, but it is just a homage to 80s slashers in the most terrible way.

It raised $50k or something on crowdfunding platforms, with cameos from some patrons.

The characters are obviously one-dimensional, the plot ludicrous, the soundtrack a lovely 80's tribute with no 80s songs, and on and on it goes.

Some of the actresses are over-acting in the best possible way, and it is certainly charming, but let's not pretend this is a cinematic masterpiece. It is what it is. It does what it is supposed to do, but it cannot escape what it is.

If you liked 80s slashers, especially the low-budget ones, this is for you. For anyone else - you could spend your time more wisely.

Apparently this film is loosely based around and paying homage to those fitness, gym horror/slasher comedy films such as Killer Workout and Death Spa. Given the premise, the story is essentially the same but for the newer generation. Once the story begins we are introduced to the characters and as it plays along, we see how the first kill occurs (the audience knows the killer but the characters are oblivious).

Nothing quite funny in this film but it's enjoyable to a degree. It is of course predictable and does include several mandatory skin scenes. The film goes downhill once the cops arrive at the scene. Trying a little to be funny which falls flat. From there scenes just occur to pass time as the inevitable turn of a full slasher occurs.