The Pool

A bad camping trip. A group is headed out for a perhaps week long camping trip. Rather then stopping in a meadow, Lennaert says they wanted to camp near water, so he goes to explore. He comes back, and tell them there is water, and it is inside a nature preserve. Seems nice enough, and the first night one of them regales them of a ghost story about strange happenings at the pond. But no real details. But things start to get strange. Is some of what is seen hallucinations or spirits? Good purchased food suddenly rots. Maggots get into food. Canned food is found broken open. Not a pleasant time, and Lenneart seems to fancy himself as a survivalist, able to overcome anything. Things just keep getting worse, and trying to walk out back to the cars only gets them back at the pond. It is more mystery than real horror, although things that happen are horrible. One can stay to the end (the movie is short) to see how it unfolds, or get bored and stop without missing much.

Never mind the 'critics' this is a nice small dutch movie, well acted, and surprisingly well done. No it's NOT a blockbuster nor was it intended to be one. Good watch anyway. gave it an extra point because of the naggers

Two Fathers go on a camping trip and take their families in tow , when they set up camp in a restriced nature reservation at the side of a small pond (poel) things quickly start to unravel. The premise of this movie is simple and the way it is brought is also simple. The Netherlands are not known for their stellar horror movies , where de lift( remade into down) was the most known one. This is the first movie from the This is not a problem tough, the movie assumes the viewer will piece things together that is a nice change from the overly explaining and " See what i discovered" things that plague most horror movies. When the movie was over the people in front of me left after saying "What a vague movie" but i did not find it vague at all, in the end i pieced together what had happened and the only trouble i had with the movie was explained to me later by the creators on their facebook. The food got spoiled or destroyed, and the puddle would not let them leave, something that made me wonder why. but the most clear answer is simple, the puddle did this to get them to go desperate. The story starts as a slow burn but sadly shows the evil of the puddle a little to soon, a little more guessing would have been nice Sure what would happen could be guessed while the movie was playing,but this is a first movie from the house of nether horror, and for a first attempt this is a great movie. And if this movie is the quality of movies that they will keep making all i can say is the future of dutch horror looks promising.

I certainly recommend this movie, but how much i liked it , the movie does not feel like a cinema movie so if you do go to see it see it on DVD, stream or even on demand.

The Netherlands always had a thing for horror, a few classics came out of that country, the best known one must be De Lift (1983). From that moment the name Nederhorror came to life.

De Poel is classified under Nederhorror due Jan Doense being involved. He's known as Mr Horror in the Dutch era so this flick did had an easy promotion and distribution. But to be concrete , was it all worth watching. Well if you think you will see a gory flick or a slasher then skip this flick. If you do like ghost stories and people going berserk by dreams they have then this is your stuff.

I must say that I do had mixed emotions about it. The positive thing is that the acting was above mediocre but the story did lack suspense. Don't get me wrong, there are things going on but after a while it's a bit predictable. After eating the fish things go rather wrong at the camping era and from there you can say, well, this and that is going to happen. The last 7 minutes do offer a bit of slasher horror with one nice killing, but i won't spoil it over here. Even clocking in at 76 minutes it's a rather short flick but it was enough due the predictable parts. Even the ending wasn't a surprise.

But the way it was shot and the effects used did upgrade this flick a lot and for some the score used will do the scary part I guess. Nederhorror? Just on the edge.

Gore 0,5/5 Nudity 0/5 Effects 3/5 Story 2,5/5 Comedy 0/5

What other reviewers seem to have missed is that this seems to be an attempt to relocate The Shining to the woods. As such it has a lot to live up to and it starts exceptionally well. There's a real and pervading sense of natural horror. It does go off rather quickly, just like the food supplies, sadly, but it showed a great deal of promise which just loses its way. Just like the characters in the story, ironically.