The Pool Reviews

A Bavarian swimming hole runs red in this bloody chiller that scares up few shudders. Final exams are over and a dozen students at Prague’s International High School need to blow off some steam. Bored with keg parties and Czech discos, these upscale hell-raisers look to class stud Gregor (Thorsten Grasshoff) for guidance and under his influence break into Prague’s premiere swimming pool. After disarming the alarm, dozen delinquents get ready to enjoy a of sex, alcohol and drug binge. But someone sinister has crashed their party, a masked figure who starts slaughtering the party animals — one girl slips down a water slide and right into the killer’s sword. Once the first corpses are discovered, the schoolmates start suspecting each other. Chris (Jonah Lotan) is particularly vocal with his suspicions: If the maniac knew all about the party plans, he suggests, perhaps these aren’t random killings. Meanwhile, the police are busy with another case and treat reports of a break-in at the pool as a low priority. Later, athletic Carmen (Elena Uhlig) tries to swim through underground channels to the outside and discovers the body of a dead policeman. Back inside, most of the recent graduates have been killed; Carmen and Sarah (Kristen Miller) spot Gregor with a sword and assume he’s the madman. After all, he's the one who set up the outing. But the survivors later learn that a false friend who's jealous of his peers’ wealthier lifestyles has gone to a lot of trouble to gather his targets into one place. Logic is verboten in this trashy slasher picture, whose deus ex machina conclusion arrives only after the sex-obsessed youngsters have had many opportunities to shed their clothes.