The Mystery Cruise (2013) Gail O'Grady, Michelle Harrison, Venus Terzo, Chris Humphreys, Peter Benson, Kurt Evans, Kirsten Robek, Larry Miller, Julian Christopher Movie Review

The Mystery Cruise (2013)   2/52/52/52/52/5


Gail O'Grady in The Mystery Cruise (2013)

The Cheese Cruise

Whilst Regan Reilly (Michelle Harrison - Seattle Superstorm) is already a private investigator her best friend, Alvirah Meehan (Gail O'Grady - Sins of the Preacher), wants to get in on the act and draws Regan in to rescuing a dog for a wealthy socialite. But Regan and Alvirah are heading off on a three day cruise organized by Regan's mum, a successful mystery writer, to promote her latest novel and all the guests are fans as well as amateur detectives who are there to take part in a murder mystery weekend at the same time. But Alvirah thinks there may be a real killer aboard and along with Regan they are going to work together to work out who it is before someone ends up murdered for real.

Well "The Mystery Cruise" is not the most original of ideas is it, a murder mystery event ends up having a real murder mystery, it is the sort of thing which 25 years ago wouldn't have been out of place in an episode of "Murder She Wrote". But that is the basis of "The Mystery Cruise" with in this case we have a double act in Regan who is a private investigator and her friend Alvirah who is wealthy, bored and is looking for excitement by becoming a crime solver. So yes we have another made for TV movie which features women solving a crime, which there is nothing wrong with other than it being another in a long line of movies which does this.

But whilst I like the basic idea I don't really like "The Mystery Cruise" as not only does it toss you in at the deep end, throwing characters at you without bothering to explain their connections it is so over the top it is painful. The over the top accents combined with the murder mystery costumes and the complete lack of subtlety is not amusing like I am sure was intended but bordering on the excruciating. Everyone is so over the top that listening to nails being dragged down a blackboard is less painful. And the thing is that "The Mystery Cruise" ends up all about the over the top nature of Alvirah and her husband and whilst I like Gail O'Grady and Larry Miller it is all incredibly cheesy.

What this all boils down to is that "The Mystery Cruise" is intentionally over the top and it wants to entertain mainly through being full on over the top comedy with extreme accents with the murder mystery part being a vehicle for the humour. The trouble is that it ends up too full on and becomes cheesy rather than entertaining.


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