Starring: Kristen Miller, Elena Uhlig, Thorsten Grasshof

Directed by: Boris von Sychowski    Written By: Lorenz Stassen and Boris von Sychowski

The Story:  One thing this movie did for me....it did show me that young people in Europe can be as obnoxious and unlikable as young people here in the USA.

Here's the problem with slasher flicks: They're all basically the same. You get a group of people together in some kind of remote and inescapable location, unleash a maniac with a knife, sword, chainsaw or whatever and watch the blood fly. At the end there's only one or two of the characters left and the killer is revealed to be a disgruntled friend or relative or some kind of supernatural/ futuristic cyborg beast. Just for Sh!ts and giggles you can throw in a cop/detective/ reporter that usually gets whacked while uncovering the mystery.

Seen that one before? In multiple forms?

Well, if you watch The Pool you're gonna see it again.

The show starts with a lone woman waiting for her boyfriend in pretty nice-ass house. Unfortunately for her a skull-masked killer shows up and kills her and the guy. We'll find later that the woman was the step sister of the killer. Don't worry, I'm not telling you anything that'll spoil the movie for you. If you've ever seen a friggin' movie before you won't care anyway.

In order to present us with a lot of goons to kill there's a lot of characters in this movie. they're all college students in Prague and we meet them as they take their final exams before graduation. Now, I didn't go to college in Prague (Sorry dudes, I went to college in Baltimore) but I didn't have to sit in a room and answer questions to my professors like these guys did. Hey, not like I care how they conduct education in Prague. But the people that should care...like the character Kim....obviously didn't. she failed her exams. Her friends didn't though, and led by the charismatic Greg they arrange to have a big party by breaking into a public pool after hours.

Hah! Man, If I was planning a big party with my closest friends I could think of about fifty better ideas than breaking into a public pool. and the real dumb part is that these guys are supposed to rich. They couldn't afford a better idea? Well, rich, except for Kim, who moans about being poor and how her life is screwed because she failed her exams. Luckily we don't have to put up with her for too long. The mystery killer takes care of her and it was a relief. I could deal with her anger about watching her "rich friends parade around without a care because they're rich" spiel, but its not their fault she failed her exams. If Kim had lived longer in the movie we'd have to hear how her socio-economic status unfairly cast her into failure, yada,yada,yada. If her family is so poor how'd she get into this college in the first place? A scholarship? If so, then isn't it really her fault she didn't graduate? (If she was doing so badly how'd she keep the scholarship? this isn't explored and it doesn't matter. I just keep ranting about it because for the short time Kim was with us she grated on my nerves.)

The other main characters didn't grate on them less, mind you, but Kim was like concentrated nerve-grating. almost as annoying is Carmen, the German sexpot character. She's the best friend of Sarah, Greg's girlfriend. Sarah, by the way is the single American character in the flick. And painfully enough, the heroine. (I'm American, but I'd like to have seen a character from another country as the heroine for once....really) Anyhow, Sarah has a tragic secret that keeps her from enjoying Carmen's favorite sort...swimming. Its lame, been done before and we know she'll overcome it in the end so I'll spoil it for you. Sarah doesn't like to swim because her dad died while saving her from drowning as a child. (And her boyfriend....who claims to love her and knows the details of this...throws a big party at a pool! The irony is so....um...stupid) Greg and his buddy Diego arrange for their mutual friend Martin to help them break into this public pool. We don't get the details, but dialogue clues us in that Martin was a classmate of theirs but was expelled for criminal activities. When asked to help with their plan Martin asks why would he want to do such a thing. Hey, Diego and Greg tell him Melanie's gonna be there! He's in! Sucker! ( I've done some really idiotic things in the past to try and get laid in the past, but criminal activity was never one of them...this Melanie just can't be that good) The only other character of note, is Frank, who has no real character traits except that Sarah turns him down when he comes on to her. Its all Frank's fault anyway....Hell, he knows she's Greg's girlfriend.

With our cast gathered and in the pool the shenanigans begin. To be honest I don't know who got killed first. It was pretty standard. the mystery killer wore an all black body suit with a half skull mask. It looked pretty cool, I'll give you that. But other than that he was just like any other movie killer. He killed with impunity, with a long blade and NEVER ran after his victims when they were running from him. Yet he was able to catch them. This dude also had the uncanny ability to be at the right place to kill someone at the right time. I think Jabootu calls it the Voorhees Unreality engine. And yes, our "heroes" don't consider the fact that there's only ONE killer and at first, like six or seven of them You know, with odds like that I'd take six or seven of my chickenest, scrawniest friends and just try to find the guy and smoke him.

I don't suppose you need a hint to tell you that the killer is Frank, given what I've told you. I hope not. Because the other instantly suspect Greg, since he arranged the party. That disqualifies him almost immediately. Come on....its way to easy for it to be Greg! You see Frank is pissed off be cause none of the girls liked him....at least they didn't like him enough to...well, you know. I have to admit, that wasn't a bad motivation for a crazy guy. When the only person left to kill is Sarah he reveals his identity. She fights back and being the heroine manages to not get killed even though Frank could have cut her into ribbons about ten times over. Now that folks is aggravating. Greg is still alive though, even though Sarah and Carmen locked him in a room when they thought he was the killer. He manages to break out just after Sarah douse Frank with liquor and sets him aflame. this is so frank can dive into the pool and grapple with Greg....and actually come close to killing him. (Even after being lit on fire!) And this is so Sarah can overcome her fear of swimming and dive in to help Greg. Maybe I'm jaded, but this really didn't make me say 'you go, Girl". Luckily for Sarah and Greg that Carmen survived her brutal stabbing and shows up with a handgun (dropped by the single policeman who was looking for the kids when Frank killed him....and yes, Frank killed the cop using the VUE.) and blows the maniac away. Naturally the police arrive in force seconds after the danger is past. Bleeech.

Yep, there was absolutely nothing new or interesting about The Pool. I'd call it a decent time waster, but honestly I was waiting for it to end so I could watch something more interesting. Its no fun watching a movie when you know what's going to happen.

Best Lines: "If it happens again, I'll kill you." -Sarah warns Greg not to cheat her anymore.

 Are you kidding me?

1.) Kim is pissed off because she failed her exams and goes nuts when Mike asks her to come to the big party that Gregg is planning. She claims she has nothing to celebrate and that she's tired of watching Mike and his rich friends act like nothing matters because they're rich. Yeah, but Kim THEY passed their exams so obviously school mattered to them more than it did to you! Then she tells Mike "Its over!". (Guess they had a relationship) Mike's better off I think. She's kind of a bitter little bitch.

2.) Not one of these characters elicit a feeling of sympathy for their predicament. For the life of me I can't think of why a group of apparently rich college graduates would want to break into a public pool for a party. If they're so rich why didn't they just f***ing rent the place?

3.) What is it with the freaking air ducts in movies? Why do people try to escape buildings, spaceships, etc, via air ducts all of the time? In this situation I can tell you that the air duct idea was the dumbest thing they could have tried. Why not just bust a damned window out? Its a pool for the love of Mike, not Fort Knox. The glass can't be unbreakable!

4.) Speaking of unbreakable glass, Sarah and Carmen lock Greg in a room by jamming an axe into the door handles. But the doors have big honkin' glass windows. Why not break the glass Gregg and remove the axe? And I don't buy this laminated glass bull that the killer says the windows are made of.

5.) Uh oh.....I've been referring to these characters as college students, but on my third viewing of the flick I saw that the sign in front of the school building says International High school of Prague. Are Colleges called High Schools in Prague? Because if they ain't, and you're trying to tell me that these victims are High School students then it makes this movie a little more dopey.

Nudity and Sex: sex is talked about and implied but no real nudity.

Huh?:

Carmen says "We'd better find a better place to hide." when she and Sarah hide in a small booth from the killer. Yeah, I'll say....the killer was only a few feet behind them. He'd have to be pretty stupid to have not looked into the BIG ASS window of the booth they were hiding in.

People do disgusting things. Admit it. We do. Can anyone actually say that they've never picked their nose or plucked crap out of their ears at least once? What makes it truly sickening is when someone does it constantly and in public. The detective in this movie fits the bill. When he asks one of the gang's buddies where they might be holding their party he's constantly scratching sh!t out of his ears and what not. Its distracting to me and I'm just watching a movie! The guy already looks like he slept in his clothes after passing out in an alley from drinking too much JD. If he were asking me I'd have to be like "Dude, can you please stop picking fleas or whatever the [unwrite] you're doing out of your hair on my doorstep?". I'm surprised this uncouth bastard didn't start wiping his ass with a newspaper in front of the guy.

When the killer...revealed to be Frank....is confronted by Sarah she sets him afire. He dives into the pool and then the fight to the finish begins. All I can say is Frank is one tough bastard. Ever burn your finger? Hurts like hell, doesn't it? now imagine being set on fire, even for a few seconds. Those are like third degree burns, my droogies. I can't say I've had the experience but man, that's gotta hurt like hell. Yet frank is able to keep on fighting with Gregg! Funk Dat!

And yet another movie ends with a happy ending when in fact the characters should be in cuffs and hauled downtown for breaking and entering, destruction of private property, etc. Let me put it this way...if a bunch of kids break into your house and one of them goes nuts and kills most of his buddies while in your house aren't you still gonna press charges for breaking and entering if the "good" kids defeat the "evil;" killing kid? They still broke into your house and your stuff got smashed!

The Final Judgment: If you're a slasher fan then you might want to check out this pool, but if you want something a little fresher, there ain't enough chlorine in the water on this one. The Inferno gives it 2 devil heads.