When I saw this movie advertised, I was immediately interested in watching it, as it seemed like an interesting horror movie that might be a bit more unique.

Like most horror movies, this started with quite a tense scene. A little girl, Rebecca, was drawn to the pool outside her house, since she’d seen her brother’s toy boat that he had (presumably) lost earlier. She ultimately ends up falling into the water, and my assumption was that something would end up pulling her under and killing her. Which was what happened…but there was a suitably creepy moment where Rebecca’s mother, Kay, speaks to her above the water. It sounded weird even before Rebecca surfaced to respond…but when she came up and Kay wasn’t there, it was immediately obvious that something more sinister was going on.

I actually thought this movie would be quite a unique one, considering that the monster wasn’t actually shown for a good portion of it. I thought the family moving into the new place were nice people, even if they did feel a bit bland. I wasn’t sure what Eve’s job actually was…and Elliot came across as a fairly stereotypical child in a horror movie who knows that something is going on, but doesn’t tell the adults around him. And Izzy constantly threatening her brother didn’t make her an endearing person at all, even if I suspect it was meant to give the movie a bit of sibling rivalry.

Once the pool creature was actually shown, I felt hugely disappointed. I would have preferred it if the entity hadn’t been shown at all, because when it was…it just looked like Uncle Fester from the Addams Family. Not scary or creepy at all.

One of the only unique things I found about this movie was the use of the illusions. At first, I thought there was going to be a clever way of using the reflections in the water to create illusions to deceive the victims…but there was no real explanation as to what was going on with those visions. I also felt that the pool creature broke its own rules when it took the cat’s life, given the ultimate revelation that it was supposed to be a life for a life.

On the whole, there was a lot of potential in this movie, but it fell short with characters who felt kind of bland, and a monster who lost any fear factor the moment it was shown on screen. It did a couple of things well…but sadly, not enough to make me want to watch this movie a second time.