Being Bored at Home Turns into an EVIL Enterprise! “Moonlighting Wives” reviewed! (Dark Force / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on May 16, 2023

They’re Housewives. They’re bored. They’re…”Moonlighting Wives.” Now Available at Amazon.com!

Unsatisfied with her distressed husband’s meager wage as a third shift switchboard operator, Joan Rand strikes up a new Stenography business to bring in a little extra cash for the household. When her new boss makes salacious advances toward her, she explores the opportunity of making more money than just on a stenographer’s wage. Roping in her only contracted typist, Joan begins to bring in beautiful, bored housewives seeking to earn dough no matter how sexually scandalous and instead of perfecting their short hand skills or their ability to read back letters aloud without error, the determined entrepreneur revamps her stenographic business as a front for perfecting prostitution. Infiltrating her way into every bar, hotel, and country club, even partnering with the country club’s golf pro, Joan’s call girl ring rides a profitable high and expands into new men-oriented territories but how long can the lucrative venture last when two vice cops are inching to bring down the elusive ring and one of her girls become scorned by the affectional eyes of love.

Sexploitation has come a long way since 1966 when director Joe Sarno helmed the scene-efficient and bored housewife subversion “Moonlighting Wives.” Before embarking full-fledged into the adult industry, Sarno blazed the trail for the economically friendly dicey skin flicks of the 1960s through the 1970s, retrospectively finding a cult base amongst observers and academics of subversive cinema and underground exploitation. “Bad Girls for Boys” producer Robert M. Moscow serves as associate producer on the Morgan Picture Corporation production, founded by George J. Morgan, producer of “The Thrill Killers” and “The Lemon Grove Kids Meet the Monster.”

Credited as Diane Vivienne, Tammy Latour (“The Naked Fog”) plays the business savvy Mrs. Joan Rand turning her dictation craft as a storefront for a more provocative and promiscuous profession to keep men happy and her pockets plush. Latour’s a cool and calculating in her performance that makes Mrs. Rand a pragmatic kingpin of her quick-to-success prostitution ring but in doing so with her performance, that is much like everyone else’s in the film denoting a sign of the time period in which the story is constructed, Latour comes off extremely monotone like her large 60’s hairdo houses a little green man at the control of her cerebral center, calling out commands flatly, coldly, and without a slink of emotion behind her absent inflections or thousand yard stares. Instead, much of the emotion, if any, is produced by her ashamed-driven to alcohol abusing husband and emotionally exploited bored housewife (Gretchen Rudolph, “The Dicktator”) brought to shambles after cheating on her husband and losing her paramour at the same time due to Rand’s scheming into the operational fold to rake in more rakes and cash. We’re treated to Mr. Rand’s bottoming out as he’s no longer the bread winner and he’s suspicions overwhelm him to drink himself into a stupor. The emotional pull that the Rand swindled housewife goes through is callously cut deep when her country club lover, Al Jordan (John Aristedes, “My Body Hungers”), becomes in cahoots with Mrs. Rand, taking her own as not only a business partner but a side-by-side lover, and coaxes his former mistress’s desire for him into doing naughty things with other men to keep him out of a deceived lie of debt. A rollercoaster of fear, doubt, acceptance, and emotional evolution goes to full arc spectrum with the one cog in the machine that ends up breaking down the whole organization into a crumbling heap. Aforesaid, the other performances don’t stray too far from Tammy Latour’s matter of fact and is more just a sign of the times in which “Moonlighting Wives” is produced, especially on a microbudget as early sexploitation couldn’t break into mainstream or even with welcoming arms in a more accepting niche public as a more right-wing, puritanical society was starting to be on the brink of uninhibited free love model. “Moonlighting Wives” has a sexploitation friendly cast with June Roberts (“The Pink Pussy: Where Sin Lives”), Marla Ellis (“Sin in the Suburbs”), Joe Santos (“Flesh and Lace”), and George Winship (“Teenage Gang Debs”).

How does a racy U.S. cinematic story beat the odds of staying out from the sleazy cinemas, like the sheltered exterior and tacky carpeted 42^nd Street of the 1980s, and from being blackballed from the blue balled public looking for a little titillating release? Innuendo in film became a thing of the past once the film boards ruled film nudity was no longer to be considered obscene a few years before 1960 and this opened up an opportunity for filmmakers to tap into the salacious half of the American population, experimenting with primal carnalities depictions that burrowed into the deepest of desires. Since financing was scarce as the newly appointed sexploitation genre was too much of a risk for return, movies like “Moonlighting Wives” were made for next to nothing and director Joe Sarno quickly became quickly an expert in churning out licentious cinema commodities on a dime at the turn of the decade. Having completed moderately successful films of this nature with “Warm Nights and Hot Pleasures” and “Pandora and the Magic Box,” Sarno built a rapport with actors and actresses who would return film-after-film. John Aristedes, Joe Santos, June Roberts, and Tammy Latour, to name drop a few, regularly frequented Sarno’s casting call – and, hopefully, not his casting couch. Much like the rest of the lot, “Moonlighting Wives” serves as a lesson learned, a steep cost if you will, when morals mingle with perversity and blur the lines of right and wrong. However, these types of films didn’t come tense action either, or rather much of any type of action because of it’s hand-to-mouth (or in related terms – any orifice to mouth) leanness in funds. Sarno masters the exposition scene with what I like to label as high school sexual education discourse in where talking heads explain in detail every single action and do it in a tone that’s somewhere between mundane and deadpan. Objectively, “Moonlighting Wives” is a cold-hard look at cause-and-effect with the loosening of standards jeopardizing what’s most dear to you after the deed is done.

As a 2k restoration from the uncensored 35mm original negative, “Moonlighting Waves” has been paradoxically upgraded by adding back in original content that initially hit by censors with the lost nude scenes, a summation of 5 minutes’ worth of film, has be reclaimed for the Dark Force Entertainment Blu-ray release. Yet, Dark Force’s release also competes with a Sarno double feature in “The Naked Fog” from Film Movement that was coincides with a similar market date. Unfortunately, we’ve yet to land our hands on the Film Movement version to compare. The Dark Force Blu-ray is AVC encoded with high definition 1080p resolution and presented in the letterboxed 1.33:1 aspect ratio. Back cover lists the ratio at 1.33:1 but also list an anamorphic widescreen and while I concur with the anamorphic lens, the presentation is firmly in a square box of 1.33:1. Prefaced with a black title card warning regarding the additional image quality, more than just the additional footage has weathered under the test time to sometimes appearing more yellowish and with vertical scratch lines and speckled dust. For the most part, the overall image presentation makes the grade with an unimposing, yet steady color grading and most of the frames free from visual blights. If there were any digital enhancements done during the restoration, DNR appears to be the present culprit as facial features often appear too smooth for 35mm stock that should be developed with a fine layer of grain. The English 1.0 audio mix furnishes the appropriate single channel output for an exposition heavy feature. Distinct sound relativity is shot and the Stan Free score is lounge music 101 with rhythmic snare and hi-hat raps but the dialogue fairs rather strongly with forefront, clean, and clear conversing. Film historian Michael Bowen bookends a pair of included special features with an audio commentary track and an on-webcam interview discussing Sarno’s life coursing the newfound sexploitation genre pre his adult industry tenure. Also included is a deleted nude scene that involves no familiar actors from the trunk narrative in a seemingly out of place couple swap of the topless kind. I’m a little taken aback by the loss of some of the special features that were a part of the Alternative Cinema DVD release that are not present here on the Blu-ray, such as the Joe Sarno interview before his death. What’s neat about the physical features of the Dark Force release, aside from the clear Blu-ray snapper, is the retrograded, stark yellow and black, low-key cover art that builds up the hype with exclamational points about how obscene “Moonlighting Wives” is and not recommended it for the modestly shy and most prude moviegoers. The bold marketing attempt really perks up interesting in checking out the title that ultimately finishes with antiquated impressions, but the idea is neat, and the word heavy front cover is very representational of the exposition drenched dialogue in the narrative. Disc art is pressed with a wanted ad for young attractive women, which is also a nice touch. the region free release comes not rated and has a runtime of 86 minutes. Without a doubt scandalous in any decade, “Moonlighting Wives” encapsulates the seedlings of sexploitation with Joe Sarno at the helm of cultivating ripe, round melons out of barely any dirt and succeeding with a lust-heavy pursuit under a profession that now, ironically enough, only exists mainly in law-abiding courtrooms.

They’re Housewives. They’re bored. They’re…”Moonlighting Wives.” Now Available at Amazon.com!

When EVIL Literarature Jumps Right Off the Pages and Starts to Hunt You Down! “Monsters in the Closet” reviewed! (Gravitas Ventures / Digital Screener)

Posted by Steven Lewis on January 11, 2022

Watch Monsters in the Closet” on Prime Video!

Eccentric horror novelist Raymond Castle mysteriously dies alone in his New York City apartment. His daughter Jasmin, who never had a loving relationship with her father, returns to her childhood home, self-negative reminiscing about the strenuous verbal arguments between father and daughter with usual themes surrounding her playing with his valuable horror collectibles and her continuous use of the Spanish language despite his desires for an English only language household, but instead of finding the contents of his will or answers to who he really was a person, as a father, Jasmin discovers her father’s latest novel, an anthology collection based off the black magic spells of a 17^th century that brings his short stories to life right there in the apartment with her.

I said it once and I’ll say it again until the day I die: horror anthologies are not my cup of tea. Sure, there are excellent oldies, aka classics, out there, like “Creepshow” and “Body Bags,” from the masters of horror and a handful of more modern, done-right, anthologies from filmmakers on their way to such a grandiose title within the “V/H/S” series, but the majority of micro-narratives nowadays are collected from the scrapings of the low-budget trash barrel due in part to the cost-efficiency of short films, shot over a lengthy stretch of time, brought together into a single feature and the types of slim budget stories can sustain a better reception in a shorter format instead of full-length one. Now, I’m not saying Zack and Spencer Snygg collaborated “Monsters in the Closet” falls into the latter category but as one of the first released films of 2022 to come across our ever-critical desk, the indie horror-comedy anthology needed to punch the living daylights out of use to begin the year and whether the Snyggs’ 4-episode, plus wraparound story, anthology slammed dunk or airballed will be covered below. “Monsters in the Closet” is a kickstarter project and a self-produced venture funded by a pair of sub-Hollywood filmmakers in Spencer Snygg, who has worked behind the scenes in the lighting department on some major films over the recent year, and a veteran indie softcore-horror director Zack whose has involvement with indie production companies like Troma and the New Jersey based E.I. Cinema, as you’ll see with a large, splayed display of E.I and Alternative Cinema posters strategically arranged as background fodder. It’s like a Misty Mundae poster celebration on exhibition.

The outer shell narrative that encompasses and unites each separate story entities begins with a frantic Tom C. Niksson as the diehard believer in his own success horror writer Raymond Castle, covered in blood, manically talking to himself, and in the throes of typing away before a cloaked stalker wielding a knife closes in on him. Niksson, who worked under Zack Snygg’s pseudonym, John Bacchus, in that Easter holiday E.I. Cinema favorite, “Beaster Day: Here Comes Peter Cottonhell,” steps into that looming, ever-present figurehead from the grave, delivering random dad joke dialogue while cozying up the audiences for an audiobook rendition of Castle’s latest bestseller, a black magic spell anthology of horror stories that come to fruition when read aloud. Other than his talking head role, Niksson’s involved in some contentious flashbacks with Jasmin as a child, but we never see Niksson and the adult Jasmin Flores (Jasmin) ever in the same scene together as the flashbacks are Jasmin voiceovers. Nikkson’s theatrical behavior perfectly suits the stagecraft atmospherics in erecting the gameshow-esque of a horror host whereas Flores is often stiff as a dry plank of wood. Limitations drawn from her lack of experience keep the actress’s timing and delivery often subdued in an obtuse and ungraceful character when escaping the ever-changing fiction-to-non-fiction villain of the minute. Jasmin, the character, is already inherently underwhelming in a role that has no purpose or buildup to understand her headspace surrounding the sudden death of her father. What do those flashbacks mean to her or are they just melancholic gibberish? And why isn’t she more interested in his death or even showing a lack of care for it? Throughout “Monsters in the Closet,” a fair amount of pleasantly surprising performances from the anthological works pull the overall project together better than those in the wraparound story. Along with a first person view zombie tale as the first short, Luke Couzens and Carmilla Crawford play newlywed new homeowners going through the frustrations of DIY Hell until they off each other with tools, the silver spoon Jordan Flippo becomes tarnished when a camping accident turns this rich daddy’s girl into an unstoppable killing machine to protect her immaculate image, and side-splitting John Fedele (“The Vampire’s Seduction”) as the humbly polite mad scientist Frankenstein who can’t get over the death of Mrs. Frankenstein (Valerie Bitner) and keeps resurrecting her despite her wishes to stay dead.

What I like and thought interesting about the “Monsters in the Closet” corpora is that they’re written in-house by at least one of the Snygg brothers, sometimes both. This extends style and control over the entire body of work boundless to the ideas and the panache of other filmmakers and showrunners without having to associate themselves. The Snyggs’ balanced anthology comes with equal levels of comedy and horror that unearths the humor in humorless scenarios sans the sometimes tired gags that can devalue a project into tedium and, ultimately, into worthlessness and since we’re already being beholden to more than one narrative that jumbles the mind, the mental capacity is too low to withstand different numerous tales in one sitting as well as to try and struggle with the bad unfunny bits. “Monsters in the Closet” at least has a whimsical darkness about it, a sinister playful attitude, and isn’t afraid to get gory from time to time beginning with the Spency Snygg directed zombie existentialistic “Please Kill Me Again” that takes the viewpoint of a recently turned woman with normal inner thoughts and intentions, but the cravings begin to take over. The Snygg brothers follow up with darkly satiric “Home Improvement” involving a new couple’s adversary journey to fix up their rundown new home to the point where they can’t take any more of the repairs or of each other and the overflowing sardonic banter starts to spill blood; this bit is fun, more than you know it relatable, and gets real nasty at the end. The weakest short is “The One Percenters” with a nob’s daughter eager to mingle amongst the common folk during a seemingly harmless camping trip that turns deadly after she accidently kills her boyfriend. Conceptually, the message is sound with the wealthiest subverting the law theme and Jordan Flippo is stunning as a plutocrat’s high expectations daddy’s girl, but the story lacks enough obstacle and tension-filled stuffing for an interesting enough short. “Frankenstein’s Wife” spotlights John Fedele’s equable, light-hearted humor in affectionately reconstructing and resurrecting the wife he accidently kills and with each attempt at bring her back from the dead, her corporeal temple becomes less and less of herself through Frankenstein’s botched cosmetic surgeries. The lovesick cycle is both deranged and full of laughs from Fedele’s riotous desperation take of a classic character.

Gravitas Ventures unchains all the creatures loose in their digital distribution of The Snygg Brothers’ “Monsters in the Closet” anthology now available on-demand and digital platforms this January. None of the audio or visual aspects will be covered since the feature is not a digital release, but when I say The Snygg Brothers self-produced the film, I mean they literally wore nearly every single departmental hat, including director of photography and visual effects that impresses with a wide range of shots from drone, to hand-held, and to tracking done with depth and various levels of focus. There is no one trick pony behind the camera. Some of the digital effects, such as the bullet holes that riddle the basement floor and walls, cheapen the already cheap production and, for the most part, the practical effects reach the passing bar with the obvious lay figure body parts and crude masks/getups. There are no special features or bonus scenes with this release that runs unrated at 88 minutes. Anthology bias be damned, “Monsters in the Closet” is a rarity in a dying breed subgenre with a jocular sense of sinister, social commentary humor braided into a tenebrous fray between man versus man and man versus monster.

Watch “Monsters in the Closet” on Prime Video!

Put Evil Into Submission! “From Parts Unknown” review!

Posted by Steven Lewis on December 7, 2016

Charlie, the daughter of a famed pro-wrestler named Daddy Bison, witnesses the tragic and accidental decapitation death of her masked father while in the ring. Years later, Charlie labors for a video game corporation with underhanded values, but she still feels the call to wrestling, secretly competing and honoring her father’s memory in moonlight matches despite her lover’s wishes. When her corrupt employer illegal obtains Nano byte technology to engineer into their latest wrestling video game entitled ‘From Parts Unknown’ in order to financially steal from gamers, Charlie accidently becomes more involved than just being an innocent bystander. A side effect to the Nano bytes turns people into a horde of flesh hungry monsters on the cusp of being let loose and only Charlie can pile drive a stop to the infected corporate white-collar workers and vicious female wrestlers from embarking on a worldwide takeover.

It’s Bloggin’ Evil is familiar with director Daniel Armstrong’s work, reviewing the Australian born director’s 2013 roller derby slasher “MurderDrome” on the Camp Motion Picture’s home entertainment label. Armstrong’s latest horror installment, 2015 released “From Parts Unknown: Fight Like a Girl,” blends a healthy dose of wrestling into the terror folds. However, this body slamming, drop kicking horror film was produced and completed by 2009, years before “MurderDrome” hit the market, and was shelved in a period of postponement because of post-production reasons, but the Strongman Pictures team bouts with more than half a decade of delays to eventually release “From Parts Unknown: Fight Like a Girl,” a complete horror-comedy battle royal!

With a DIY façade, a talented actor pool dedicates themselves to undertake the high flying, death defying professional wrestling moves of PCW, Professional Championship Wrestling, in Australia and, I must confess, the actors looked legit. There’s an indescribable amount of pleasure and respect that goes into actors braving the chance of injury and accomplishing their own stunt work. Kudos to lead actress Jenna Dwyer for her stunt work to which in an example of her character, Charlie, is air-flung across the square ring and into a metal cage and she falls behind the ropes, landing hard on the mat below. The stunt looked fantastic. To coincide with the physical performances, Armstrong’s script uses slapstick comedy that’s heavy on the satirical undertones. Ross Ditcham’s a good character to spotlight as his role of Frank is the story’s buffoon, branded as being the best friend who doesn’t get the heroine girl of his dreams while running wildly whenever danger, or a brazen female supervisor, is hanging on his coattails.

The combination of performance and wit does hunker slightly from being overshadowed by the wonky cinematography. Every applied color of the rainbow saturates various scenes to, perhaps, wash away the dull gray and white tones of the minimalistic warehouse location or to attempt to upscale production value, but the extreme use of this method conflicts with sharp image details, leaving an opaque and blotchy picture. There’s also some odd framing from either the production or postproduction distribution that’s disrupts the clarity of the actions in the scenes. On the plus side, a solid, passable effort was put forth for the gory special effects, especially when Josh Futcher’s Misha violently implodes the head in of one of the henchwomen with a fire extinguisher, splattering upward a healthy amount of blood while Misha quoting, many times, Ash from “Army of the Darkness.” Tack on superimposed electric current superpowers, a tactical high-powered Uzi, and a little person donning a luchador mask and tights and “From Parts Unknown” tickles all the right parts of your delinquent, shameless senses.

Story wise, a loose introduction semi-torpedoes the backend of Charlie’s growth and embattlements, albeit the killer effects and various degrees of solid acting. The convoluted scenes of stealing the Nano bytes and sprinkled in segments of the Bison Daddy’s fate attempt to set up two simultaneous merging narratives that end up not meshing well or delivering the intended message. After the progression surpasses the Nano Byte mishap, the story starts to take shape, forming more coherently and appropriately to pit our lovely Charlie against an apocalyptic foe, setting up define characters, and setting the stage for an all out slobber-knocker! When Charlie and her mortal allies have the odds against them when rivaled against superhuman opponents, a clear indication that’s just more than good versus evil. Under the surface, Charlie is faced with life adversaries: her unethical boss, an advantage taking supervisor, and other female wrestlers. All of which become flesh eating maniacs and want to rip Charlie apart.

“From Parts Unknown: Fight Like a Girl” has pinned a DVD distributor with the indie label Camp Motion Pictures. The not rated DVD contains a short film “Post-Apocalyptic Chic,” “Fight Like A Girl” music video, Haunted by Humans Music Video, Demented music video, and a trailer vault. Like previously mentioned, the posterized video quality is noticeable within the confines of darker color hues and, especially, in the blacks. The LCPM 2.0 mix audio quality goes in and out with rocky levels of dialogue and ambiance. Graced with an ozploitation with great collaged cover art, Daniel Armstrong’s “From Parts Unknown” and Camp Motion Pictures are a wrestling match made in a hell in a cell! The best wrestling horror film since Mexico’s El Santo films!

“From Parts Unknown” on Amazon.com!

Evil Rollerblades Over Your Neck! “Murderdrome” review!

Posted by Steven Lewis on September 23, 2016

Cherry Skye and her all girl roller derby team, The Alamos, find themselves gravely threatened by a summoned vengeful demon named Mamma Skate, the best and brutalist skater from the MurderDrome rink 20 years ago who was viciously murdered ritualistically by a Satanic-obsessed rival. Called back from Hell by a mystical charm necklace once in her possession, Mamma Skate rollerblades through the night, cleaving her way through the roughest of roller derby girls, and seeking to possess the soul of charm’s current owner, Cherry Skye, so she may live once again!

In 2013, Australian director Daniel Armstrong had a vision. A vision that includes skimpy-cladded, brazenly jagged roller derby girls, a resurrected she-demon wielding a butcher’s cleaver, and a helluva lot of rock-n-roll! A joint effort between Strongman Pictures and a slow drip of miscellaneous funding constructs that very exact vision, originally not conceived to have been a feature length film. Writing along side Trent Schwarz and Louise Monnington, who also had a co-starring role, Armstrong’s rockabilly ozploitation is a blood diamond in the Australian under bush with kangaroo pouches full of ocker comedy and skater mayhem. However, Armstrong’s terrorizing roller-demon imagery sat on the edge of being nonexistent and his film suffers the associated consequences of financial hardships and production problems. “MurderDrome” has a vibe more akin to a music video with interjections of storyline in between various psychobilly laid tracks that’s perhaps a pure result of the film’s financial inability to fill the void, but the style’s unique outline contends strongly in independent or abstract cinema outlets. Aside from the atypical structure, “MurderDrome,” granted, has some sloppy and choppy editing that disrupt not only the opening credits, but also waters down a death scene or two and affects character motivations.

Australian accents are thick coming from an indigenous talent of actors led by Amber Sajben, a downright heaven-sent leading lady starring as Cherry Skye. With her cutesy pig tails, high-knee fish stockings, and an acute fascination with always popping bits of food in her mouth, her contrast with the dialogue-stricken antagonist and steel, chain, and blade attired roller-demon badass Momma Skate, portrayed by Be-On The-Rocks (Yes, you read that right), redefines the old phrase a game of cat-and-mouse that doesn’t quite fit the overall artistic style. When a group of rough and tough roller derby girls who elbow check others for the fun of the sport, some fight should commence without being said; instead, the characters who proudly carry the names Cherry Skye, Psych, Thrusty, Trans Em, Princess Bitchface, and Hell Grazer option to scurry without giving a second thought to bucking up to a sole skating murderess. Armstrong subsides more toward a comedy route peppered with a resilience attitude toward the situation with co-writer Louise Monnington leading the charge in her character’s crude humor, especially having Pysch, her character, note descriptively what exactly is ‘duck butter.’ Urban Dictionary has you covered if you care to look up the term. The cast rounds out with Kat Anderson, Rachael Blackwood, Jake Brown, Anthony Cincotta, Gerry Mahoney, Max Marchione, Daisy Mastermann, Dayna Seville, and Laura Soall.

Plot integrity is flimsy at best striking influentially at the development of certain characters, most importantly with villain Momma Skate. Her conjuring doesn’t go through the comprehensive ringer as the demoness just appears without establishing a connection with the charm necklace bringing her demonic lankiness above ground. Max Marchione’s The Janitor bares some importance that whizzes like air out of a rapidly deflating balloon as we learn less-by-less about this character throughout the duration of the film. The Janitor’s key mentoring role wavers, resulting in just one more confusion aspect into the blend. Remaining character developments are fairly cut and dry sans forgetting their eclectic attire, electrifying neon makeup, radical hairstyles, and overall lifestyles, but expansions upon the roles could have been more favorable for the Aussie production.

Camp Motion Pictures and Alternative Cinema skate the “MurderDrome” DVD right onto the North American market rink, providing the film’s first region one release. Extras are abundant with music videos from The Dark Shadows and other bands, a gag-reel, and a behind-the-scenes special effects featurette. The 72-minute feature is presented in a widescreen 16×9 aspect ratio that’s a bit hazy at times on the grayscale, but adds charm to the bargain bin brimstone fire and smoke computerized effects that truly defines Armstrong’s slasher as a campy ozploitation with Italian Giallo undertones and a supernatural core. “MurderDrome” rocks, literally, with great pyschobilly tracks from The Jacks, The Sin & Tonics, and The Dark Shadows to name a few of the head banging headliners on the soundtrack in the confines of a cavity heavy plot for a film more suitable as a music video than a feature flick. In the end, “MurderDrome” provides an endearing look upon horror even with all the obvious flaws, but renders some nice moments of searing barbarity overshadowing, just slightly, some of the misfires. Lastly, if you like girls in skates, who never take them off at any point, then “MurderDrome” is right for you!