The Workout
September 9th, 2025
MOVIE: THE WORKOUT
STARRING: PETER JAI, JOSH KELLY, ASHLEE EVANS-SMITH, KRISTOS ANDREWS
DIRECTED BY: JAMES CULLEN BRESSACK
AMovieGuy.com’s RATING: 1 STAR (Out of 4)
RATED: R
RUN TIME: 83 MINUTES
When a film critic sits down to watch a movie, they don’t hope to hate it — they want to love it. That’s especially true for independent films, where passion often outweighs polish. Unfortunately, The Workout, a low-budget revenge-action film from director James Cullen Bressack, is more disappointing than outright terrible. There’s effort here, no doubt, and even a flicker of artistic ambition, but the result is a film that feels both inadequate and exhausting.
The story begins simply enough: a couple is filming a workout video for their YouTube channel. Wyatt (Peter Jae) and his pregnant wife, Becca (Galadriel Stineman), run through squats while her brother, Levi (Josh Kelly), films. Then, a group of men storms the gym demanding money. The confrontation turns deadly. Becca is killed, her baby survives, and Wyatt is hospitalized. Upon waking, grief and rage drive him to seek revenge, enlisting Levi to help track down the killers.
It’s a standard setup for a revenge thriller, but The Workout quickly runs out of steam.
Blame can’t be pinned on any one aspect. This film falters across the board. From the opening scene, the acting is wooden, resembling a string of audition tapes more than a coherent narrative. Jae and Kelly are given space to explore a range of emotions, but none of it feels grounded. Even the action fails to deliver: martial arts scenes and shootouts are filled with clumsy choreography, telegraphed punches, and bottomless magazines. Rarely has an action movie felt this inert.
One of the film’s strangest choices is its use of the found-footage style. It begins logically enough, with the characters filming themselves, but even after that narrative justification ends, the film continues in a jarring POV format, seemingly as a budget-saving tactic. It quickly becomes a distraction. Scenes blend into each other with little variation: Wyatt and Levi confront yet another mob boss (including one played by the great Maurice LaMarche), engage in another shootout, and have another run-in with the sporadically appearing Detective O’Brien (David Josh Lawrence). Rinse and repeat until an anticlimactic finale.
There’s effort here, and that counts for something. Independent filmmaking is a challenging arena. Everyone involved clearly wants this project to succeed. But ambition alone isn’t enough. The Workout looks cheap, feels cheaper, and leans on a revenge plot that’s been recycled too many times to count.
There may be potential in Bressack and the team he’s working with, but this film won’t be the one to unlock it. The Workout might flex a muscle or two, but there is little here to get pumped about.
1 STAR
THE WORKOUT PREMIERED AT FANTASTIC FEST IN 2024 AND WILL SOON BE AVAILABLE ON VARIOUS STREAMING PLATFORMS.
Written by: Leo Brady
