Staged Killer is a 2019 thriller about a former co-host who works his way back into the professional life of a popular TV morning show before it all falls apart.
You know the story. It happens to us all. Your college dreams of celebrity fame and misguided romantic feelings for that hot guy/gal don’t come true so … you end up years later an alleged murderer on a twisted bend of bitter revenge looking to go viral. How many times, right? Well, that’s kind of where we are with director Christopher Ray‘s quasi-thriller Staged Killer, a by the numbers drama that paints in broad strokes in muted colors, doing what it can to be exactly what it is, a pulpy generic bit of fluff on the heap amid many others now streaming on Netflix.
Let’s meet Naomi (Chrishell Hartley), a bouncy, pretty college girl co-hosting a university pep show with Jake (Jason Dolley), the two a popular on-camera duo that one fateful evening sees her interviewing (and uh-oh … kissing) the all star football quarterback. This stirs some jealousy from Jake and the athlete’s recently broken up with girlfriend. Next thing you know, the all-star is dead on the pavement, literally stabbed in the back and Jake is the prime suspect. Flash forward ten years and now Naomi is co-hosting a morning variety show, doing fairly well but slipping in the ratings. In town arrives Jake, looking for work, and manipulates his way into a chance meeting with Naomi, soon enough scheming his way to an on-air appearance when he, well … perhaps that’s best for you to see for yourself.
Staged Killer is a murder mystery minus the mystery, a whodunnit with the who put front and center and the dunnit played out in three easy steps. That’s by design of course, the filmmakers not trying to make anything all that challenging, stringing together a plot that is as transparent as a pane of clean glass. That leaves it to the actors, all of whom embrace the goofy with a kind of over-the-top zest, maybe knowing what they’ve got themselves into and having some fun with the material. Naturally then, there’s um, nothing natural about it, everything artificial to the point where these people exist in some kind of alternate unreality where not much makes sense.
But the reason you’re here is not because you don’t know that already. What you want to know is whether it’s worth it or not? Well, that would seem an obvious call. Staged Killer is a bad movie. It’s not even trying not to be a bad movie. It’s hopelessly bad with Dolley especially taking the ‘bad’ to new levels – his clear intention – stepping in line with the rest of the movie’s absurdity. Lacking the necessary violence and menace it demands, it’s vanilla to a staggering degree. And for that, there is some fun to be had, the aggressively generic, toned down effort loaded with entertainment possibilities for those who enjoy watching movies like this for the sheer wild-eyed what-the-heck-is-going-on? fun of it. Count me one of them.