Not too many horror movies revolve around terrifying swimming pools. For an entry in this minor genre, we go to 2024’s Night Swim.

Due to a degenerative condition, Major League Baseball player Ray Waller (Wyatt Russell) retires early. Eager for a fresh start, Ray moves into a new house with his wife Eve (Kerry Condon) and kids Izzy (Amélie Hoeferle) and Elliot (Gavin Warren).

This property comes with a swimming pool, a factor that should aid in Ray’s physical therapy. However, a dire secret comes along with the pool, one that threatens the safety of the Waller family.

As I mentioned at the start, “spooky swimming pool” doesn’t offer a concept around which many movies come based. That’s probably because it seems like an inherently silly conceit.

Granted, one could make the same claim for most stories that revolve around haunted locations. Perhaps because so few houses come with pools, though, this choice feels more detached from day-to-day experience and more questionable.

Whatever the case, Swim goes out of its way to attempt to churn terror from this aquatic location. It doesn’t work.

Of the myriad flaws on display here, the primary concern stems from one common to modern horror: jump scares. These abound, as Swim can’t resist the urge to go more than a few minutes without another cheap “jolt moment”.

Despite the semi-novel notion of a scary swimming pool, Swim feels utterly derivative. Some of that stems from the ample influences it wears on its sleeve.

Swim milks potential underwater terror via multiple shots that heavily echo those from Jaws. Indeed, the filmmakers seem happy to wink at the audience via elements like a shark head replica in the Wallers’ fish tank.

In addition, we get obvious links to other flicks like The Shining and It. Whatever creativity comes from the basic plot gets destroyed by the persistent series of allusions to other films.

Even beyond that, Swim suffers from its utterly contrived nature. The story goes out of its way to conjure reasons to place characters in the pool, all simply to generate attempted scares.

Emphasis on “attempted”, of course, as nary a spooky or frightening moment arises. Instead, the main reaction here stems from the relentless eye rolls the ridiculous narrative provokes.

Although I give Swim some credit for its unusual concept, nothing else about it succeeds. This turns into a trite and absurd horror flick.

Night Swim appears in an aspect ratio of 2.39:1 on this Blu-ray Disc. This turned into a well-rendered presentation.

Sharpness looked solid. A few shots were slightly soft, but not to a substantial degree, so most of the movie seemed accurate and concise.

No jagged edges or shimmering occurred, and I saw no edge haloes. Source flaws were a non-factor, as the movie stayed clean.

Like most modern horror, Swim favored a mix of teal and amber. Within their parameters, the colors appeared solid.

Blacks seemed deep and tight, while shadows were smooth and well-delineated. In the end, the transfer proved to be appealing.

I also felt positive about the pretty good DTS-HD MA 7.1 soundtrack of Swim. Given the nature of the story, moody environmental information dominated the mix.

These elements filled out the speakers in a fairly involving manner. The movie didn’t become a constant whiz-bang soundfield, but it created a strong sense of place.

The more active “scare moments” used the spectrum in the most dynamic manner, but they failed to appear on a frequent basis. Instead, music and moody ambience became the most prominent components.

Audio quality was fine. Speech seemed natural and concise. Effects depicted the elements with solid accuracy and boasted pleasing low-end when necessary.

Music showed positive clarity and range, and they also packed solid bass response at times. This was a perfectly positive mix for the material.

A few extras appear, and we get an audio commentary from writer/director Bryce McGuire. He offers a running, screen-specific discussion of influences and inspirations, story, characters and themes, cast and performances, sets and locations, editing and photography, effects, music and related domains.

Despite some of the usual happy talk, McGuire offers a pretty solid chat. He goes over all the expected topics and freely acknowledges all the cinematic references I mentioned - and more. This turns into a quality commentary.

Four featurettes follow, and Masters of Fear spans six minutes, 45 seconds. It provides info from McGuire, producers Jason Blum and James Wan, executive producers Ryan Turek and Judson Scott, and actors Wyatt Russell and Kerry Condon.

“Fear” examines the movie’s origins and development, cast and performances, and McGuire’s approach. A few minor insights emerge but the piece mostly offers praise for those involved.

Demons from the Depths goes for seven minutes, 16 seconds. Here we find remarks from McGuire, Scott, Russell, Turek, Wan, makeup effects designer Justin Raleigh, 1st AD James Moran, 2nd 2nd AD Esraa Darwish, makeup effects department heads Ozzy Alvarez and Kelsey Berk, and actors Liz Parkinson and Gavin Warren.

The show looks at story/characters, the movie’s stabs at horror and various effects. Though a bit on the fluffy side, at least this one comes with some decent notes about the movie’s creature creations.

Next comes Into the Deep, a five-minute, 50-second reel. It offers details from Russell, Wan, McGuire, Condon, Turek, Moran, Blum, Scott, underwater DP Ian S. Takahashi, and actor Amélie Hoeferle.

“Deep” discusses the swimming pool setting and challenges involved with filming there. Expect another mix of good notes and puffy talk.

Marco Polo lasts four minutes, four seconds. This one involves Turek, McGuire, Wan, Hoeferle, Moran and Scott.

As implied by the title, the clip covers the movie’s “Marco Polo” sequence. Not much substance arrives here.

One disappointment: the feature film adapts a 2014 short made by McGuire and Rod Blackhurst. It would’ve been a nice addition to the disc but it fails to appear.

A second disc offers a DVD copy of Swim. It includes the same extras as the Blu-ray.

Night Swim comes with a semi-intriguing conceit but almost wholly flops as a movie. Contrived and silly, it lacks any real horror or momentum. The Blu-ray comes with solid picture and audio as well as a mix of bonus features. The movie becomes a silly waste of 98 minutes.