For the second trip to Cineworld in 2024 I headed out to check out Night Swim which I was looking forward to seeing after seeing the trailer several times at the cinema. But would this new Blumhouse movie be one that made me jump?
After being forced into early retirement by a degenerative illness, Ray Waller, a former baseball player, moves into a new house with his wife and two children. He hopes that the backyard swimming pool will provide physical therapy for himself and be fun for the kids. But soon, a dark secret from the home’s past unleashes a malevolent force that drags the family into the depths of inescapable terror.
The film opens with a scene in 1992 of the pool that we see in the trailers, we are given a few characters that we will later find out a little more later in the film, but for now, the opening sequence sets up the film that there is something that is just not right in the innocent looking swimming pool.
We then jump forward to the present day as a new family buys the property and starts to settle in. Still, the pool is something that the family will have to go up against and the mystery of what is in the pool that is causing the “horror” will terrify the family in the long run.
When I first saw the trailer for Night Swim I had some high hopes that this would be the first cinema watch that would make me jump or at least make my skin crawl, but sadly not. After the opening scene, the film moves along at a rather slow pace and focuses more on the family than what could be lurking beneath the water.
I found myself waiting for something to jump out and terrify me, but despite the nice cinematography of the nighttime shots and the underwater scenes Night Swim just didn’t grab me the way I was hoping it would.
There are some good effects in some moments of a “creature” in the water, but the overall feel of the film is just so slow. There are a few opportunities where there could have been some real use of some jump scares and even some gory moments but sadly we get a rather subdued horror that takes on the thriller genre more.
Maybe it’s just me, having seen so many horror movies over the years it takes a little more to scare me. There may be some out there that can’t cope well with horrors, no matter how subtle they are, and it’s those people watching the film that may jump.
It’s a real shame as Night Swim had some potential and the trailer sells it to you to expect so much more.
Does Night Swim Have Any Post Credit Scenes
The latest movie from Universal and Blumhouse does not contain any post-credit scenes. Once the credits start to roll and the screen turns black, the movie is over.
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