Tanya Murani

I loved this movie. This movie was based on a 1973 short story by Stephen King; it revolves around two daughters and their single father as they deal with the sudden death of their mother. The characters are well rounded, and feel like real people. The set was well made, I really felt as if their home was a lived space that fit the family that was living there. The home is important, because King uses a lot of atmospheric horror in his stories, and sometimes it fails to translate to the film medium. When it does, it does so well, like in the original Pet Semetary film, with Judd's house towards the end of the movie. Like his great movies, this one captures that atmospheric eeriness in certain scenes. This house is their safe space, their family dynamic was strong, there's a lot of love in the house. It makes it so much more of an impact when that gets infiltrated. When this thing, this Boogeyman descends upon their lives. This movie is well worth the watch, if you're looking for some good scares, atmospheric uneasiness, well written characters with great acting this movie is the way to go. Obviously it has its critics who expect every single film to somehow break new ground, and blow their minds in every scene. I feel like people who judge movies so harshly don't really appreciate the horror genre. They should be watching 12th century period pieces, documentaries about the French revolution, or slap stick comedies...what I mean is, they should just leave the horror genre alone.

*Warning Spoilers* (Read until you see the Spoilers Notice below) I liked this movie, and I would've loved to have given it a five star rating. I am a true fan of horror; I am able to watch a movie and look at it and ask myself, "Was I entertained?" Not every horror movie is supposed to be one of the greats, it's silly to judge every horror movie by those standards. If I am able to sit back, watch, and enjoy the time I was watching, I call that a win. That's what this movie was. Night Swim was not trying to break new ground in the genre of horror. They were not trying to reach inside your mind, body, and soul and move you in a deep and disturbing way with this movie. They were making a horror movie, with a unique premise, that entertains for the duration of its playtime. It accomplishes that. ***********************Spoilers Beyond This Point************************** This movie should be five stars because it was good, because they accomplished what they set out to accomplish. It should've been five stars because the acting was top-notch, the characters were well written, and the dialogue had a natural flow. There are many reasons to rate this movie five stars, but I cannot bring myself to do so. The reason I refuse to give this movie the five stars it would've earned is because of the worst over-used cliche' disgusting horror movie trope. I am sick and tired of watching the cat die. There is no reason to force people to watch feline and feline and feline get butchered, slaughtered, eaten, stabbed, thrown, hit, and so on in every single movie we chose to watch. It's gross, it doesn't serve the plot, and more so it's just lazy. Whenever we see a cat in a movie we already know what is going to happen to it. Sometimes it doesn't even have to be a horror movie, Hollywood kills cats in all sorts of movies, and quite frankly it isn't funny, or entertaining. Dogs live more often in horror movies than cats. Dogs even get to play the hero more often than cats, even though statistically your cat is more likely to try to save you than your dog. Don't get me wrong, I'm sick of dog deaths in movies, too. Unless it somehow serves the plot there's no point in murdering animals in movies. Animals and their trainers work hard in Hollywood to act in movies in order to be believable, further the story, and entertain. Such hard workers deserve more from the industry, and quite honestly more from us. Cider, the cat's character in this movie, had so much more to offer. Cats are traditionally, mythological, and spiritually known to sense evil, to walk between worlds, and in many beliefs fight dark forces. With a resume like that it seems like Cider would've never gone near the pool, and done his best to keep his humans away from it as well. Also it seems likely that the pool demons would've avoided Cider at all costs. I'm just saying it's lazy, it's stupid, and the movie lost a whole star for it. Why I would expect anything less from disgusting Hollywood is beyond me. It's an industry that honestly seems to get off on grossing all of us out, and forcing some of the dumbest and most disgusting concepts on us. I'm not talking about the horror genre, honestly, horror seems to be the last genre in the industry that at least tries to entertain.