Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water,\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0\u201cNight Swim,\u201d your annual January horror movie from\u00a0the folks at\u00a0Blumhouse.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cNight Swim\u201d occupies the same spot on the calendar that \u201cM3GAN\u201d held a year ago.\u00a0And while nothing could ever possibly reach that film\u2019s gonzo heights or cultural significance,\u00a0everyone seems fully aware of the\u00a0supremely\u00a0silly premise\u00a0they\u2019ve\u00a0signed up for\u00a0here.\u00a0It\u2019s\u00a0about\u00a0a pool … that eats people.\u00a0Producers Jason Blum and James Wan, both horror titans, once again\u00a0show\u00a0they\u00a0know how to freak\u00a0audiences\u00a0out while\u00a0maintaining\u00a0a sly sense of humor.\u00a0We\u2019ve\u00a0seen inanimate objects get anthropomorphized for thrills and chills before in the form of \u201cRubber\u201d (about a homicidal tire) and \u201cIn Fabric\u201d (about a homicidal dress). But a pool just\u00a0seems so\u00a0relaxing, so luxurious, that the idea of it turning on\u00a0the\u00a0very people who seek its soothing embrace\u00a0provides\u00a0an inspired twist.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
The fact that the pool in question is so aggressively bland is also a nice touch.\u00a0This is not some\u00a0mid-century, kidney-shaped oasis. Nor is it a\u00a0modern-day\u00a0monstrosity\u00a0with\u00a0built-in slides, a swim-up\u00a0bar\u00a0and a grotto. This is a concrete, rectangular hole in the ground, the kind of pool you\u00a0probably\u00a0spent\u00a0long,\u00a0summer days\u00a0playing\u00a0Marco Polo in if you grew up in Southern California in the\u00a01970s.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Writer-director Bryce McGuire toys with the notion of\u00a0an ancient and insatiable\u00a0evil lurking below the surface of banal suburbia in\u00a0expanding\u00a0the\u00a0short\u00a0he made with Rod Blackhurst into\u00a0his debut\u00a0feature.\u00a0That\u2019s\u00a0not\u00a0a novel\u00a0idea;\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0the stuff of Stephen King and David Lynch. But McGuire\u00a0establishes\u00a0enough tension off the top and makes effective use of sound design and camera angles to create a lingering, unsettling mood.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
A flashback to 1992\u00a0reveals\u00a0a\u00a0pigtailed,\u00a0tween girl getting gobbled up by the pool when she\u00a0reaches out\u00a0at night to retrieve an elusive toy boat. Cut to the present day, as a family is about to move into that same house with a pool\u00a0that\u2019s\u00a0crumbling\u00a0from\u00a0decades of\u00a0neglect.\u00a0Early on,\u00a0McGuire makes some striking choices\u00a0with\u00a0upside-down shots and\u00a0reflections, including\u00a0the\u00a0bright\u00a0image of clouds and\u00a0blue sky shining\u00a0on the leaf-strewn pool cover.\u00a0This place may seem\u00a0inviting, he\u00a0seems to be\u00a0saying, but\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0unreliable.\u00a0The steady gurgling and belching of the filter\u00a0provide\u00a0an unsettling rhythm, and\u00a0the groan of the diving board suggests further dangers to come.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Waller family finds the\u00a0clean-up\u00a0prospect daunting at first, but\u00a0they\u2019re\u00a0also optimistic about\u00a0the stability\u00a0and healing they hope this home\u00a0outside the Twin Cities\u00a0will bring. Ray Waller (Wyatt Russell) is a former major league baseball great whose multiple sclerosis diagnosis has forced him to retire from the game\u00a0that\u2019s\u00a0long defined him. His wife, Eve (\u201cThe Banshees of\u00a0Inisherin\u201d Oscar nominee Kerry Condon),\u00a0looks forward to\u00a0laying down roots\u00a0after moving the family from city to city\u00a0for\u00a0so many years.\u00a0Teenage\u00a0daughter\u00a0Izzy (Am\u00e9lie\u00a0Hoeferle) has gotten better at fitting in by\u00a0maintaining\u00a0an\u00a0attitude of cool detachment, but younger brother Elliot\u00a0(Gavin Warren), a shy, scrawny kid,\u00a0hasn\u2019t\u00a0been as successful.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water,\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0\u201cNight Swim,\u201d your annual January horror movie from\u00a0the folks at\u00a0Blumhouse.\u00a0 \u201cNight Swim\u201d occupies the same spot on the calendar that \u201cM3GAN\u201d held a year ago.\u00a0And while nothing could ever possibly reach that film\u2019s gonzo heights or cultural significance,\u00a0everyone seems fully aware of the\u00a0supremely\u00a0silly …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[48,37],"class_list":["post-1292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-horror-movies","tag-horror","tag-thriller"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1292","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1292"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1292\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}