January used to be known as the month when studios send movies that they don't believe in. Over the last few years, I feel that has drastically changed and no month seems that way anymore. Well, Blumhouse's latest release in Night Swim made me feel like it was one of those January's again. I had no expectations for this one, as the trailers didn't even really do it form, but I decided to give it a watch. After viewing it, I can say that this will likely be one of my least favourite movies of 2024. There's just no substance here. Let's dive in (pun intended).
Night Swim follows the Waller family as they move into a new home with a swimming pool and then realize that the pool is haunted. The mother Eve (Kerry Condon) is first to be terrorized, followed by her daughter Izzy (Amélie Hoeferle) and her son Elliot (Gavin Warren). The catch is that the father Ray (Wyatt Russell) has an illness, due to his professional baseball career, and the pool chooses to heal him instead of haunt him. The "explanation" for it all is terrible and there is no real story here either. Night Swim is just about a family's drama and things just happen to them. You do get a backstory of the pool itself, but it doesn't progress the story and it felt pointless.
The most frustrating thing about this film is that both Condon and Russell knew the film they were acting in and they gave it their all. They deserved a much better script to work with here. I will also give props to Charlie Sarroff for the camerawork. His unique style in recent horror films like Relic and Smile elevated the material on-screen, at least in my opinion, and it also did so with Night Swim. There are some cleverly shot sequences that I won't deny are a positive toward the film, but the look of these scenes and the adult performances are all I can grasp at here.
Night Swim has a very weak screenplay and an overall story that is far too thin, and for being a film with the title that it has, I'd say only about 30 minutes revolves around the pool. It also has an ending that you can pretty much predict because of some information that is told to you earlier on. I don't like to be overly negative when reviewing a movie, but other than a couple of minor saving graces, this is quite a bad film. I left this screening wondering what the point of the movie even was and that's not a good thing. I also releaized that it was based on a short film from a few years ago, which makes a lot of sense because I can see a few moments working as a tight little 5-minute thriller, but that's it. Unlike films like Whiplash, Lights Out or even Saw, some stories just don't translate. Night Swim is now playing in theatres.
Night Swim follows the Waller family as they move into a new home with a swimming pool and then realize that the pool is haunted. The mother Eve (Kerry Condon) is first to be terrorized, followed by her daughter Izzy (Amélie Hoeferle) and her son Elliot (Gavin Warren). The catch is that the father Ray (Wyatt Russell) has an illness, due to his professional baseball career, and the pool chooses to heal him instead of haunt him. The "explanation" for it all is terrible and there is no real story here either. Night Swim is just about a family's drama and things just happen to them. You do get a backstory of the pool itself, but it doesn't progress the story and it felt pointless.
The most frustrating thing about this film is that both Condon and Russell knew the film they were acting in and they gave it their all. They deserved a much better script to work with here. I will also give props to Charlie Sarroff for the camerawork. His unique style in recent horror films like Relic and Smile elevated the material on-screen, at least in my opinion, and it also did so with Night Swim. There are some cleverly shot sequences that I won't deny are a positive toward the film, but the look of these scenes and the adult performances are all I can grasp at here.
Night Swim has a very weak screenplay and an overall story that is far too thin, and for being a film with the title that it has, I'd say only about 30 minutes revolves around the pool. It also has an ending that you can pretty much predict because of some information that is told to you earlier on. I don't like to be overly negative when reviewing a movie, but other than a couple of minor saving graces, this is quite a bad film. I left this screening wondering what the point of the movie even was and that's not a good thing. I also releaized that it was based on a short film from a few years ago, which makes a lot of sense because I can see a few moments working as a tight little 5-minute thriller, but that's it. Unlike films like Whiplash, Lights Out or even Saw, some stories just don't translate. Night Swim is now playing in theatres.