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Evil Has Surfaced

SUMMARY

12 students from an international school intend to make an illegal farewell party in a big swimming pool in Prague. Nevertheless, soon it became the matter of life and death when a mysterious assailant begins a bloodbath massacre toward them. Taking inspired by the new-wave slasher,”Scream" and the old school, "Friday the13th", "The Pool" is a fun thrill-ride. This Germany flick is featuring many international actors, lead by the American actress, Kristen Miller.

PLOT

The night is young, but as the rain unstopping to pours since the early evening, make the ambiance is so dark and wet. Catherine (Anna Geislerová) is alone in her big house and preparing a romantic dinner with her boyfriend, Oliver (Josef Pejchal). A car arrives and Catherine thinks its Oliver. Well, she isn’t utterly wrong, because when she checks the car, she find Oliver in the back in the steering wheel with his throat slit. Hysterically, she runs back to the house and locks it. Little does she knows, the white skull masked-killer already broke in to the house. When she finally meet with the killer, there’s no use to her to run, because with a big machete, the killer swings a lethal jab to her. Catherine falls on the pool and makes it turn into red.

The story continues as the exam is over in an International High School in Prague. A bunch of young kids, led by Greg (Thorsten Grasshoff) plans to celebrate it secretly in a lavish pool house in Prague. Because of that, Greg drop a line to Martin (Jason Liggett), whose have a name for certain breaking, to open the pool’s gate that must be has been close in the night. Sarah (Kristen Miller), Greg’s American girlfriend, is not so interesting with his plan, but Greg convinces her and she eventually agrees to join the party.

Beside Sarah, Kim (Isla Fisher), Mike’s (James McAvoy) girlfriend dislikes the plan too, because she fail to pass the exam and she upset because she believe that Mike and his other rich friends are have nothing to do but do some fun and never do anything worthy in their life. The arguing make Mike leaves Kim alone in the lake. While she walking back to town, the killer is stalking her. Frantically, she tries to running away form the killer, but the killer manage to chase her and embedded that big and sharp machete through her body.

Meanwhile, courtesy the competent hands of Martin, the party is on that night, and including Greg and Sarah friends; Frank (John Hopkins), that have crush with Sarah (and many other girls), Carmen (Elena Uhlig), Sarah’s best friend that can hold her breath long in the water, Mel (Cordelia Bugeja), the reason why Martin willing to join the party, Chris (Jonah Lotan), the jock, and also Mike, Diego (Maximilian Grill), Tommy (Daniel Wurm ), Carter (Bryan Carney), and his girlfriend, Sevnja (Linda Rybová). The party continues as escorting by sex, alcohol and the teenage angst.

All her friend in the mood for cheering up, but Sarah reluctantly close to the water, because she’s so tormented by her horrific past. Her father died just to save her form drowning, when she was a little girl. That’s why she’s so mad, when the oblivious Chris attempts to throw her to the pool.

In the other side of town, Detective Kadankov (Jan Vlasák), investigate the murder of a young woman. The suspect is the woman’s brother, because he has a history for an acute disturbing mentality. Based on the detective's investigation, the brother is now attending a sort of party with his friends! The only problem is Detective Kadankov is so clueless about the party’s site.

Back in the party, Carter and Svenja decide to make their own private party; they are playing around with the water slide. Carter is waiting in the pool, when Svenja jump in the water slide. Suddenly, the killer appears from underneath the water and butchered Carter. Unbeknown to Svenja, her death is waiting on the end of the water slide, as the killer pop in his machete beneath it and make Svenja unable to avoid her death, courtesy the machete’s spatter on the water slide.

Soon, the dead bodies of Carter and Svenja are finding. They are freaking up, and try to go out the pool, but they unable to open the pool’s gate, no matter how hard they try. They start to suspect for each other, especially with Greg, because he’s the master plan of the party. But Greg argues in disagreement. He submits his self to find a way out, with Diego and Tommy are assisting him. Meanwhile, the other suspect is Martin, because he’s seems to be vanishing.

Unbeknown to anyone, Martin is in a romantic scene with Mel in the gym. They are so close to get intimate, but Mel ask Martin to get some “protection”. Mel is alone then, when the killer rush in. She is trying to runaway. Through the locker room, the killer stalks Mel. Unexpectedly by Mel, the killer swings his machete to Mel’s feet from down under. When Mel scream in agony, the killer stab Mel to death.

The rest of the gang, Sarah, Carmen, Mike and Chris finally meets up with Martin. They accusing Martin for the killing, but Martin deny it. He start to feel so anxious about Mel, and they decide to look upon her. They are realizing someone trying to kill them all, since they find Mel’s dead body. Frantically, the rest of them try to find the way out. They manage to know that in order to going out they have to go through the vent. In exhausted, Chris refuses to go through the vent. But he asks Mike to find help as soon as possible.

In the vent, they are not safe neither, because from down the vent, the killer insert the machete continuously, and turning the vent like a Swiss cheese. The first victim is Mike, who’s impaled from below. When they almost come to end of the vent, Martin comes as the next victim. Frightened, Carmen and Sarah try to flee from the killer. When they are safe enough, Carmen says his opinion, that the killer might be Greg. She tells Sarah about her past relationship with Greg. Sarah is so obnoxious with the fact that Carmen just loaded to her and when Greg comes into them, she become so angry with Greg. But Greg refuses the accusing. In a struggle, Carmen hit Greg with a heavy thing. When Greg drop unconscious, Carmen and Sarah locks him up in the room. Now the only way out is to dive into a long water-channel. Since Sarah refuse to get into the water and Carmen is able to hold her breath, so Carmen must dive the water-channel to seeks for help. Carmen is succeeding to reach the end of the water-channel though, but before she can do anything further, the killer waits for her there. The machete’s stab make Carmen fall down back into the water again.

Meanwhile, Detective Kadankov manages to find the pool party. It looks that the person he tries to find is one of the partygoers. But before he can break into the pool, the killer’ stab him to die.

Now, alone in the pool side, Sarah finally meet the real killer in a vis-à-vis. In order to survive, Sarah must overcome her fear of water, before it’s too late.

 

COMMENT

Despite the cheesy (and corny cliché) it possess, this Germany flick is a fresh approach in the genre with mixing the old and the new style altogether. The result is a decently fun watch slasher.

The plot has many holes and sometimes make us seat in a boredom (courtesy of many empty and pointless dialogues), but the gore’s scene are so strong, yet deliciously made and that make this is an enjoyable result. The cinematography is good for this kind of movies, adding it a plus point. “The Pool” also has many memorable scenes; the death in the water slide, the stalking in the locker room, and the machete that pop-in from beneath a vent.

The cast from the international actors also put some good point, even much of them have nothing to do except getting smitten and getting butchered. Most of the male actors are need to act more properly, but almost all the female cast is good. Kristen Miller, who’s also featured in “Cherry Falls”, plays the American heroine with a respectable performance.  Elena Uhlig plays the most interesting character and she is also an interesting actress too. The only bothering is her English dub dialogue, like any usual dubbing is so bad. Isla Fisher is a good both in acting and physical, very reminiscent of Nicole Kidman. She will be the next best thing if she able gradually fined a respectable scripts and roles.

The direction from Boris von Sychowski is better than the averages from this genre. He succeeds to make an enjoyable slick and hip film. Because of that, the blatant rip-off from it previous is not so annoying. The final result for “The Pool” is still a mediocre, but certainly we can stand to a great entertainment, as long you don’t expect award winning film here.

The Untamed Beholder

The Pool © 2002 Senator Film

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