Bryce McGuire's new film - following a nuclear family terrorized by a haunted swimming pool-refuses to embrace the silliness of its premise nor the terror of its scares.
IT FEELS SURREAL to see Hollywood take a page off the tattered book of Regal Films, a major film outfit from the Philippines. Every remotely unnerving thing seems to have been given its schlocky horror film already under Regal’s umbrella, from haunted fridges to haunted wedding dresses to haunted Christmas trees. Bryce McGuire’s Night Swim feels remarkably Shake, Rattle & Roll-esque in that the silliness of its premise feels integral to its charm, but also serves as its own mischievous saboteur, always seemingly at odds with its more serious antics. Suffice it to say, if you’re hoping for a zany, fully self-aware outing not too different from recent hits like M3GAN and Malignant, you can take a plunge elsewhere.
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That isn’t to say it didn’t have profound ideas. There are pellets of thought-starters tossed in there, however murky. The film’s cereal packet family is led by Ray and Eve (played by Wyatt Russell and Kerry Candon, respectively), a young couple hoping for a reset in the suburbs when Ray, a rising baseball star, becomes afflicted with multiple sclerosis. At their physician's recommendation, Ray is urged to do water therapy — an ideal prospect because their brand-new home (which they bought at a fraction-cost) comes with a pool. A lot is visibly resting on the move, and that weight is distributed mainly on Eve’s shoulders, taking on a smaller job at the school while her spouse tries to recover at home. The film pokes its head inside the rabbit hole of gender dynamics but never fully — *ahem* — dives in (a mistake that recurs throughout the film).
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So, they have a haunted swimming pool. And Ray has taken a shine on it when it promised a future of full recovery and return to his sport. Of course, this is all but a clever ploy for him to bring the pool of unwitting victims to either seize or merely taunt (the latter happens more often). The pool sometimes takes over him, like some Ron DeFeo from The Amityville Horror if voices from under chlorine pool water possessed him. Mysteriously, he recovers his strength and becomes newly nimble. And it seems like he’s doing the haunted pool’s bidding when he suddenly asks Eve to host a pool party, inviting all their neighbors.
All of this unfolds as one contrivance leads to the next. There are subplots concerning Ray and Eve’s children, but nothing too exciting or relevant to the finale. The dialogue is pretty tough to sit through, too.
That’s all fine. If I’m watching a horror movie about a haunted swimming pool, most of my anticipation goes to the lengths the filmmakers will go to milk every moment in this particularly liminal place in suburbia, and make it capital-S scary. To some extent, McGuire succeeded. Every setpiece imaginable they tried to execute. The eponymous dip in the pool happens midway through, and it’s pretty scary, especially when it shows the abyssal depths that the haunted pool can sprawl down below, triggering not only the subnechanaphobics but the thalassophobics as well (like this writer).
The idea of a literal underwater-world is fascinating. Alas, the film laps around its history with cryptic expositions cut short with Russell’s Ray finally driven by the pool’s Overlook-like curse to madness. It isn’t something we haven’t seen before, though: the bloodlust with which he used the Captain America shield in that scene in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier is so horrific (even without showing the gore) Stephen King’s haunted washing machine almost gave up its title of The Mangler. And that’s just what stunts Night Swim; the scares are moderate, the story largely inconsequential. I wish it embraced the silliness of its conceit if it wasn’t going to go balls-to-the-wall with the horror.
Stream it? Yes, but dive in with caution. ❌
ABOUT THE FILM
🏊♂️ Night Swim dir. Bryan McGuire | Horror, Thriller | 🇺🇸
Forced into early retirement by a degenerative illness, former baseball player Ray Waller moves into a new house with his wife and two children. He hopes that the backyard swimming pool will be fun for the kids and provide physical therapy for himself. However, a dark secret from the home’s past soon unleashes a malevolent force that drags the family into the depths of inescapable terror.
Other horrors I've watched this month:
Here are the rest of my horror viewings this January. For real-time reviews and quick takeaways, follow my Letterboxd 🟠🔵🟢!
The Wailing (2016, dir. Na Hong-jin)
😈 The Wailing
dir. Na Hong-jin | Horror, Drama | 🇰🇷 🇯🇵
One of my favorite Korean occult horrors. The way that folk horror melds with police procedural aspects just feels fresh, even eight years after I’ve first seen it. I’m sure I’m missing a few things about what it’s trying to say about South Korean identity, but even in broad strokes, you get a vividly nightmarish picture of the demons that haunt Korea — death, deceit, and oblivion.
Mallari (2023, dir. Roderick Cabido)
⛪ Mallari
dir. Roderick Cabrido | Horror, Thriller, History | 🇵🇭 🇺🇸
Can’t redeem this film in my head. Taking plenty of creative licenses, it still managed to partake in transphobic and classist rhetoric, exploiting the real-life horrors of transwomen and the impoverished to craft an alarmingly sympathetic portrait of an astral-projecting serial killer. Worse, it isn’t even all that scary.
The Wicker Man (1973, dir. Robin Hardy)
🌾 The Wicker Man
dir. Robin Hardy | Horror, Thriller | 🇬🇧
Worth revisiting for the final shot alone. A clear precursor to Ari Aster’s Midsommar. The discussion on faith and religion gets tiresome in parts, but the environmental slant is especially resonant given the context of what’s happening now.
The Blackcoat’s Daughter (2015, dir. Oz Perkins)
🔪 The Blackcoat’s Daughter
dir. Oz Perkins | Horror, Thriller | 🇺🇸
Watched in anticipation of Longlegs. Aged well, I think, given how recent times have magnified the importance of mental health. The nonlinear approach works, though I wish it were used less as a narrative conceit than a cinematic representation of the protagonist(?)’s fractured psyche. The use of the occult stuff is great; presented less as its own affliction, but more of a symptom of one’s loneliness.
Horrors to watch this week
A list of noteworthy horror releases coming to theaters, VOD, and streaming.
🪓 Ti West’s Xis coming to Netflix on February 2nd.
Field Notes From Hell is Deep Cuts’ weekly email digest. Dispatches go out every weekend, with handpicked horror news, capsule reviews, and outlook on upcoming titles you can watch.
