Pool Party Massacre

There's nothing groundbreaking here-- girl throws a pool party, uninvited guys show up, and people start dying. The kills are fun and the movie is cheesy in that special camp sort of way you want it to be.

My biggest problem with the movie is after people start dying, you expect someone to eventually notice and the remaining people have to react. That doesn't really happen until the last 10 minutes with the final girl in this movie. One-by-one each character finds a reason to go off alone and the killer picks them off. It's fun at first, but by about the half way point it's just killing characters you already don't care about.

When it gets to the last few remaining characters, you really just want it to be over. The kills are cheap and fun but it begins to wear thin by the end and the characters aren't nearly enough to carry the movie all the way through.

After the online Facebook hype and the rave reviews, much like the film "Don't F**k in the Woods," I was looking forward to seeing this. It is an 80's tribute film, same things MANY low budget people are doing today. So much so that it has ALMOST worn out it's welcome and I LOVE 80's movies. This one has some nice production value and a nice look, even if some of the basics of film production seem to be ignored. And when a film uses a tagline promoting itself in the same breath as "Slumber Party Massacre" you had better deliver. It ALMOST gets it and then takes a nosedive off the deep end of the pool.

Why do almost all low budget films today have to have a group of people who are so nasty. First of all, they are all the same characters. Over and over. And the writers always make me hate them. Terrible people. I have no emotional investment at all in any of them. This is what the originals did right. Watch Halloween, Slumber Party Massacre and Prom Night. Why did I like them? I found people to care about. Even Terror Train and Motel Hell gave us defined characters. It is one thing to want to make a tribute to those films, but these low budget teams today are missing the vital points. They copy the music, they try and outdo the gore, they steal the formula. But they don't get it at all. Maybe when they are better at their craft.

I watched a PG film, Happy Death Day along with this. And I loved it. I normally hate PG movies, especially horror movies. If it would have been gorier, it would have been perfect. The same with Final Girls from a few years ago. Too tame in the gore for me, but great movies. Really good writing. This movie could have been as good, and should have been, but the writing let it down. And the gore. This film should have really went all out with the gore. I wanted to love this, but it was not bloody enough and I had no one to care about.

Still, I do see promise in the film. I would like to see what this team can do as they get better and have a few movies under their belts.

"Worst pool party ever!" When her wealthy parents go away redhead Blair invites her equally spoilt socialite girlfriends around to her nice house for afternoon drinks by the pool but a couple of uninvited guys turn up, as does a maniac intent on spoiling the fun. Very low budget horror comedy that is also an homage to 1980's slasher movies, for example the opening credits feature some very 80's looking computer graphics and the soundtrack has synth music that was commonly used back then. When I bought this on DVD I was hardly expecting to see a great film and the reality is that it isn't good, but likewise it isn't terrible either. By far the best thing are the kills, the unknown killer uses different tools (axe, saw, claw hammer, electrical drill, etc) for each victim. They are gory, plentiful and inventive (and thankfully not CGI). Much of the acting is terrible though I did like Kristin Noel McKusik as Blair. One of the uninvited guys is a bloke with a receding hairline, moustache and looks like he's 30 odd, he is present for "comedy" value but his constant talk of sex and masturbation soon becomes tiresome. The identity of both the killer and the obligatory Final Girl are very obvious though there is a twist. The film is set during the summer but was actually shot during apparently freezing winter weather in Nevada, credit to the them as I'd have never have know this had I not watched the extras (which are more entertaining than the movie itself!). The cover promises hot girls (check) and nudity, there is some of the latter but I had hoped for more. The party in the title isn't exactly what I'd call a party, just a few drinks by the pool, corpses can be seen blinking and breathing, and the film crew are reflected in glass at least once. Drew Marvick, who wrote and directed the movie, has an obvious passion for the horror genre and as a fellow horror fan I can only commend him for making this film. The movie could have been better but I expect that I will watch it again in the future and am happy with my purchase.

As an Independent filmmaker, I thought the lighting, sound, cinematography and sound mix was well. I rated down because I was too fawn of the performances, story, or script. I am not your typical person who enjoys this genre. I watched it because for the resources they had, I was curious on how it looked overall. I didn't like it and I most won't watch it again but I did recommend it to people I know that love this kind of material, and they loved it! I would watch this director's material again to see how he feeds his niche audience. Overall, well done.

In swanky suburban Las Vegas, a group of girls have a pool party and a couple of dudes show up. Unfortunately a mysterious slayer, who uses various yard tools to do his gruesome work, puts the kibosh on the proceedings.

"Pool Party Massacre" (2017) is a micro-budget Indie that only cost around $7000 and it's amazing that a fairly entertaining slasher can be made for that low amount. To keep the costs down, the writer/director shot it at his impressive abode in the suburbs of Las Vegas.

The acting of the no-name actors isn't bad considering what they got paid, as long as you don't mind campiness and the fact that their characters are all unlikable, except one. Their lines are delivered in a rat-a-tat-tat manner, as if they were reading from a teleprompter, yet I was impressed with the work that was put into the wordy script even though the characters are disagreeable which, let's face it, was intentional.

Speaking of which, the writer/director satirizes the slasher formula and includes all the main staples. In the female department curvy Alexis Adams as blonde Tiffany is the most attractive, but Margaux Némé as Latino Nancy wins the day in all-around beauty. The movie scores pretty well on this front.

While the one-dimensional setting, low-budget vibe and distasteful characters/antics limit the flick and lower my grade, it moves right along and has quality kills/gore if that's your thang. I was also pleased with the proverbial final girl.

The movie runs 1 hour, 21 minutes, and was shot in Las Vegas.

GRADE: C- (but compared to other spare change slashers that cost around the same amount, it rates much higher)