Death Cycle (2025) Review

Luca (Matthew Ninaber) is a journalist who receives a call from his sister Caterina (Sasha Ormond) which breaks the news that both their brother Eddy (Matt Daciw) and their cousin Ray (Justin Bott) have recently died. Cat also wants Luca to return home in order to investigate just who’s got it in for their family. A shadowy, leather clad figure on a motorcycle appears to be responsible for the growing body count but who could it possibly be? Are they somehow connected to local woman Anna Dale (Kristen Kaster), whose own sister was killed in a hit and run in which Anna was also seriously injured…

One of director Gabriel Carrer’s previous works, For The Sake Of Vicious, also featured bikers with murder on their minds but where that story doubled down on grimy violence in a home invasion action format, Death Cycle’s kills are of the more considered, stylishly shot, giallo-inflected type, with Ninaber – yes, Psycho Goreman himself but he’s focused on hunky boys this time (or is he?) – delving into cover ups and potential revenge plots before the, er, death cycle comes full circle.

That’s not to say the violence isn’t soft pedalled whatsoever. Heads are stomped into tarmac, folks are repeatedly stabbed, there’s a nasty near decapitation, there’s a nasty actual decapitation and so on. Anyone thinking Carrer has suddenly decided to go for suggestion over bloodthirsty kills can tick the box marked either “disappointed” or “delighted” depending on their taste. I love giallo, I love the arty framing of various deadly acts but I also like to see unethical folks getting what’s coming to them with slightly more emphasis than a splash of stage blood and Death Cycle delivers the destruction with brio.

What you don’t get here is all that much of a mystery, as the viewer is dropped straight into the inciting incident right at the beginning and Luca’s investigation hinges mostly on a talk with Anna, who’s still coming to terms with her loss and her extensive injuries. The pool of suspects isn’t that large to begin with and, whereas a number of giallo titles would have pulled out a ridiculous, last gasp twist that defies logic, Death Cycle steps away from chucking in an unexpected, brain melting motive for the slayings and settles for the obvious, which shows how just how few dots required joining in order for Luca to get to the truth.

If you’re looking for a plot which ties itself in knots in order to obfuscate what’s really going on, Death Cycle is the opposite of that and its simplicity in delivering what could have been a tangled mess of retribution-driven carnage is somehow refreshing yet slightly bewildering, leaving me waiting for a twist that never arrived and giving Luca far more of an opportunity to escape the leather-clad menace than most of the others in his family.

Still, Carrer’s filming of the set pieces proves he has a knack for visuals that are both attractive and horrific at the same time and the demises of both Eddy and Ray, mentioned in the set-up, are not just brushed off as plot dressing. They’re giving their full due in juicy, gruesome flashbacks so there’s no chance of feeling shortchanged in terms of a limited body count due to a small cast. The shots of the biker riding to dispatch the next target are pleasingly ominous too, enhanced by the thrum of an unstoppable rock soundtrack from Jacob Lizotte and Bonnie Trash. As with For The Sake Of Vicious, Foxgrindr also shows up for score duty, which is never a bad thing.

Overall, Death Cycle shares the short on plot, heavy on style trappings of the colour saturated, Euro chic annihilation fests to which it frequently nods and some viewers may bemoan the lack of complexity but the kills are the star of the show here, with the character interaction generally serving as connective tissue between one gory demise and the next. Performance wise, it’s the sisters doing it for themselves who manage to rise above the gruesome goings on, with Ormond’s twitchy, reluctantly crowned head of family and Kaster’s sympathy light survivor making their respective marks, the latter relishing the nearest thing you’re going to get to a complicated arc. Otherwise, the attention is squarely on glossy extermination and if that’s your kind of vehicle, you should hop aboard for a claret-splattered ride.

Movie Rating:

Death Cycle trailer