Arriving at the ass-end of the 1980's (THE decade of the health spa!) & following hot on the heels of the 1987 spa-based Slasher movie, "Aerobicide" aka "Killer Workout". The totally bonkers "Death Spa" injects the straight ahead Stalk & Slash approach with a Supernatural element which greatly differenciates it from it's closest comparison. In fact, the film feels closer in execution to the 1987 cult classic "Prison" than anything. Except here we have a bunch of gyrating gym-rats instead of grim faced convicts being terrorized by a seemingly ghostly force within the walls of their local health spa. There is a rather cool moment during the opening title sequence where lightning strikes the neon lit sign above the training facility to knock out the power to all the letters except the D, E, A, T, H, S, P & A. So from the outset we know that we're in the hands of a film maker who gets it, or so we think...
...But the truth is that while the film remains entertaining from beginning to end, "Death Spa" just keeps falling apart at the seams every time it tries explain exactly what is happening on screen. It's the kind of film which sets itself up to be a somewhat serious take on the Supernatural Slasher subgenre, but gets sillier & sillier the more it starts to reveal itself. The deaths themselves start out sudden & disturbing, but later go so completely over the top that they resemble a gruesome cartoon come to life with exploding body parts & even an attack from an...umm..frozen fish! 😂 So while I do love crazy kills as much as the next person I did find the tonal shifts in "Death Spa" to be a little intrusive if not entirely problematic. The film definetly boasts more creative kills than "Aerobicide" ever had, but even so the climatic set piece is ripped straight out of "Carrie". A film which "Death Spa" doesn't stand a ghost of a chance of matching in any way...
...And yet when we reach the abrupt ending all we can really do is applaud the film makers for knowing exactly when to roll the credits & spare us the kind of "Carrie"-esque final jump scare we're half-expecting by that point. "Death Spa" is a film which draws you in with a strong opening, serves up all the flesh & blood you're expecting from the premise & then just goes completely off the rails with some of the most ludicrous leaps in logic. But even by that point you'll have had a good enough time with it to remain on board for the duration. There are of course countless better films you could watch, but there are also a lot worse! "Death Spa" is undeniably bad, but it's never boring & that really is the best kind of bad you can hope to encounter! Look out for genre icon Ken "Dawn Of The Dead" Foree, a young Brenda Bakke (in ALL her glory!) & some fine effects work by Mel "Bride Of Re-Animator" Slavick.
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