‘6 meters deep pool. No water. No ladder. No way out.’
The Pool is a 2018 Thai survival horror film about a young couple stranded in an abandoned six-metre deep swimming pool along with a crocodile.
Written and directed by Ping Lumpraploeng (Khon hew hua), the Dark Army Studio-TMoment production stars Theeradej Wongpuapan and Ratnamon Ratchiratham. The original titles are Narok 6 Metre and นรก 6 เมตร.
Plot:
Day (Theeradej Wongpuapan), an insecure art director of a commercial production company is left alone to clear up a six-metre deep deserted pool after a video shoot. He falls asleep on an inflatable raft due to unbearable fatigue.
When Day wakes up again the water level has sunk so low that he cannot climb out of the pool on his own. He screams for help but the only thing that hears him is some creature from a nearby crocodile farm…
Reviews:
“Matching the relentless aggression with which it puts Day through the wringer, The Pool regularly impresses with unfailing MacGyver-like ingenuity. I’m not sure if the crocodile is all CGI, an actual animal, or probably some mixture of both, but it looks terrific. The Pool also makes an honest-to-goodness character out of Day’s dog Lucky, leading to a heart-wrenching finale with an unexpectedly emotional wallop.” Culture Crypt
“Overall The Pool makes incredible use of a relatively simple premise. It’s nothing more than a b-grade survival film that takes concepts from prior films such as Castaway or Life of Pi, but The Pool knows this and plays on what it is brilliantly. The camerawork elevates a lot of moments which could easily be boring…” Eastern Kicks
“The crocodile scenes are highly effective, with some well-earned nailbiter moments and some jump scares, to boot. The animation and visual effects by Riff Studio and Alternate Studio are terrific. Director of Photography Prayuk Srithongkul does a wonderful job capturing the action…” Gruesome Magazine
” …there’s a winning streak of gallows humour at the heart of the movie’s excruciating escape attempts, hollow triumphs and various brutal confrontations with the (superbly realised) crocodile. The script is outrageously contrived and the slo-mo drama corny – but it is dedicated to pure entertainment, not reality…” HorrorScreams VideoVault
“Naturally, Day will always fall asleep at the worst possible moments, because that is how it goes. The important points are how cleverly his Olympic pool-sized prison is constructed and how dexterously Lumpraploeng maintains the tension in this ultra-claustrophobic setting. This is some remarkably skillful minimalist genre filmmaking.” J.B. Spins
“A high-concept joyride that hits you in the pleasure receptors and the heart, The Pool is among the most purely entertaining recent additions to the stuck-in-one-place subgenre. Writer/director Ping Lumpraploeng gives his audience a likable, average protagonist who faces incalculable odds, and comes out a better, more resilient person on the other side.” Rue Morgue
Technical details:
91 minutes
Aspect ratio: 1.78: 1
