The Pool (2002)

A mixed bag of attractive and empty-headed international students spend their final day of school at a large and ornate indoor pool in Prague. As they while away the evening with alcohol, dancing, and casual sex, a masked killer whittles down their number in a variety of gruesome ways. While imitation is still the sincerest form of flattery, it's likely that Messrs. Carpenter and Cunningham et al. would find this European-made slasher film more insult than homage. Director and cowriter Boris von Sychowski's debut attempts to ape Wes Craven's Scream, but his risible dialogue and inept, crazy-quilt cast only succeed in presenting a more aggravating version of that film's self-conscious tone. It's numbingly derivative and lowbrow from start to finish, and only the most non-discerning gorehounds will find anything here worth their 89 minutes. For the truly commitment-free, Artisan's DVD presentation includes some behind-the-scenes interviews. --Paul Gaita Amazon.com

Suspenful and clever!

I watched this movie at a sleepover and it's so scary! It's very good and I really recomend it to anyone who wants to watch a scary (and bloody) movie. I have to admit it, the acting is not great, but the script and the suspense is great! May 14, 2006

Friday The 13th In A Rec Centre

This is the typical B grade slasher pic that rips off Friday The 13th. It's basicly putting Jason Voorhees (A guy in a mask with a machette knife) into a situation where he can slaughter a bunch of college grads who have broken into a rec centre for the graduation party.

The acting is mostly terrible, the scares are stupid, the horror is not there, and the chill factor is in the minus 10 area. About the only kill in the movie that was any good was one of the kids coming down a water slide...but it didnt show anything memorable for the effect to work to its maximum potentiol.

Ya might wanna rent it to laugh at how bad it is, but otherwise, dont bother with it, you're not missing anything special. February 20, 2006

Good, Tense Stalker-Killer Horror

A not particularly original but still solid entry in the 'lurk, chase, and kill' section of horror, "The Pool" covers familiar territory but does it well. A group of students from an international private school creep their way into a private building with an Olympic-size swimming pool for an end-of-the-year bash, only to find themselves preyed upon by a black-clad assasin. What the basic premise lacks in originality is made up for somewhat in the details; there are some innovative and jolting moments and pursuits, and it attains an unnervingly real feel in places. Not a classic of the field but good, and it came along at a time (2001) when it was desperately needed - "Friday The 13th", "A Nightmare On Elm Street", et al. were temporarily in limbo, replaced, mostly, by parodies. 2001 was the year, internationally, when movies like "Dagon", "Jeepers Creepers", "Valentine", "The Devil's Backbone" and "Bruiser" were starting to kick the door back in for horror movies to become hugely successful again, beyond the loyal following that stayed with them all through the latter half of the 90s, and "The Pool" was a solid little part of that long-awaited rennaissance.

It did well enough theatrically in Europe that a sequel is apparantly coming out soon. I liked the first chapter, and I think the potential exists to get significantly better in any future installments. As it is, "The Pool" is a fine movie, recommended to fellow fans of F13, "Halloween", NOES and similar greats. January 6, 2006

Straight to video garbage.

I don't know what bothered me the most with this film was it the annoying pop punk soundtrack or the fact that the script was written by a monkey. The pool could be one of the most dreadful slaher films of all time, it was just to awful and I just can't believe anyone could give this a positive review right here on amazon. Well I was deffinently tricked into believing that this film might by good and have a lot of gory death scenes but I was mistaken, once you get through all the sh** acting then you will find what resembles a storyline involving some foriegn teens who just graduated from highschool and have decided to celebrate by having a pool party so they get slaughtered by what seems like the most pathetic looking killer I have ever seen the death scenes weren't that good either so there was nothing else that I could look forward to. So I suggest you avoid this unless you like watching crap like I know what you did last summer heck even that film wasn't this bad. August 31, 2005

the pool is cool.

it lacks originality and has a weak plot but its still good. tones of blood and gore. and a cool ass pool. better than other cheap slasher movies. worth watching. July 9, 2004

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