Animal attack movies have come back into fashion in recent years; the cinema screens have seen Jason Statham take on a Megolodon in The Meg, Dwayne Johnson tackle a gorilla in Rampage, and Kaya Scodelario face down alligators during a hurricane. Now comes Thailand’s offering, The Pool. The Pool opens in a rather snappy (literally) fashion, before rewinding to fill in the background. Here we meet art director Day (Theeradej Wongpuapan), his dog Lucky, and his girlfriend Koi (Ratnamon Ratchiratham), on set of his latest project. This set is a massive six metre deep swimming pool, one that Day will soon become very familiar with. The next morning, Day is tasked with clearing down the set – alone – during which he succumbs to his fatigue and has a nap on an inflatable bed. Upon waking he realises that the pool is beginning to drain, and he’s unable to get out. Then begins a desperate fight to escape, one made worse when, through a series of unfortunate events, both Koi and a vicious crocodile end up trapped with him.
At ninety minutes, The Pool manages to not out-stay its welcome. There’s always the temptation to tag on an extra scene here or there that drags the pace down, but there’s no such issue here. Day is thrust into his predicament fairly early on, and once trapped things don’t let up. One might wonder how much mileage can one film get from a man trapped in a swimming pool, but writer / director Ping Lumpraploeng has plenty of disasters up his sleeve. With so many catastrophic events happening to one man in such a short span of time, you have to question what on Earth he did to warrant such bad karma. In all honesty, I’m struggling to think of another character in film history whom experiences anywhere near as much bad luck as poor Day does. The constant stream of mishaps serves to keep viewers engaged, but also significantly contributes to the unreality of the situation. It’s obviously difficult to maintain drama in a single set environment, but by stuffing in so much in in an attempt to hold the audience’s attention, all credibility is lost. The heightened actions and consequences mean that you can’t really take the film seriously, but given how thickly things are piled on, it’s hard to know for certain whether Lumpraploeng was intentionally trying to make a farcical comedy, or it’s just the result of too many hardships.
As much as all the adversity may detract from the realism of the piece, Lumpraploeng still manages to instil a sense of tension and dread in the viewer. At times Day comes across as the most stupid man alive, and you may find yourself shouting at the screen to stop him from making yet another obvious mistake. These moments of frustration, in an odd way, help the audience align with Day, and as idiotic as his choices may be – sticking a hand inside a sleeping crocodile’s mouth, climbing barbwire, ripping fingernails off – the audience never turn on him.
In terms of our villain, the crocodile doesn’t feel all that ferocious. When it attacks, the damage that it delivers is impressive, but it’s very much a case of when the croc isn’t on screen, it’s out of mind. This doesn’t line-up with other animal attack movies as they tend to rely on the unease of when the animal will strike to keep the momentum going. Also, our beast is pretty obviously CGI, something that also strips away the threat element. This is clearly a result of a modest budget and crocodiles aren’t the most willing of thespians, but it consequently lacks that same urgency that others in the genre have.
A film that is more than likely trying to be taken seriously, it sadly becomes rather farcical when you see just how much our hero has to contend with. In spite of this though, The Pool is an entertaining and engaging watch.
The Pool is available to watch on Shudder now.
The Pool
Summary
Despite some silliness, and a ropey CGI predator, The Pool still manages to reel the viewer in for a good time.
