A movie like Pool Man will one day be studied as what the hell goes wrong with first-time directors have no clue of what they’re doing. The fact that this movie premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival on Sept. 11, 2023 wasn’t an odd coincidence. Someone must’ve seen this movie to allow Chris Pine’s directorial debut to even be allowed in the festival. And then they thought, schedule it for Sept. 11.
Pine proves that you don’t have to be coked out of your mind like Stephen King 40 years ago when he made Maximum Overdrive to make a piece of garbage. However, that movie is fun to watch for its campiness. Pool Man is hard to watch at all.
To be honest, I only made it 25 minutes in before I realized Jesus Christ would’ve stood on the water as he pressed Pine’s Darren Barrenman underwater a good 10 minutes before I quit watching. Pine tries to attempt a Chinatown meets The Big Lebowski movie.
Instead, his character reminds me of the people I went to school with who tried to sound intelligent by telling me I didn’t understand what Liz Phair meant when she said “fuck” in her sounds. No, I understand. People trying to sound like they’re smarter than they really are irritates me. It’s like that scene in Empire Records where that guy tells the other guy, “Like do you know where Harvard is?”
And I don’t care for that movie either. But at least I was able to get through it. This movie is like a riptide that is pulling you out but slowly that you have to be a fool to be sucked out to the ocean.
Pine assembled Danny DeVito, Annett Bening, Jennifer Jason Leigh and a lot of other actors who have been good in better movies and they will be good in better movies after this.
As for Pine, was he trying to make a cult movie? Or was he trying to make a Coen Brothers movie? For those that could watch the remaining 75 minutes, you probably will never have to prove your courage ever again.
What do you think? Please comment.
Zane Says 