When Hollywood actor Chris Pine decided to make his first film, fans of the Star Trek And Dungeons The stars loved the charismatic leading man’s vision, but when the series came out, it was a total flop – until its recent release on Prime Video in the UK, where its reputation is slowly improving.
This film is Poolmanwhich Pine not only directed, but also wrote and stars in. Danny DeVito, Annette Bening and DeWanda Wise also star. It’s a neo-noir story about a Los Angeles pool cleaner who stumbles into a conspiracy revolving around the real estate of his beloved community.
After the film was shown at several film festivals until 2023 (including the London Film Festival, where this author saw it), Poolman was released in select US theaters in May this year. In the UK, the film was much harder to see until it landed on Amazon’s streaming service Prime Video in late June.
Poolman was a bit of a flop in the US when it came out, and if you take a look at Rotten Tomatoes, it’s not hard to figure out why… it was completely panned by critics and, in a rare example of unity between the two groups, audiences as well. It has a 22% rating on the Tomatometer and a 20% rating with audiences.
Critics and audiences seemed to enjoy Pine’s performance, but basically hated everything else about the film: the weak script, the over-the-top direction, the simplistic story, the incomprehensible message, and the fact that it relies too heavily on references to other crime films.
Willy-nilly, Poolman really seems to be a passion project for Pine as he showcases his love for these noir detective stories. However, if you’re not familiar with these stories or don’t like the kind of lighthearted LA detective stories, you won’t get much out of it.
The bad reviews could have meant the end for Poolmanbut as mentioned, Prime Video is doing really well. At the time of writing, it is the fifth most popular video on Amazon’s streaming service; unlike Netflix, Prime Video includes both TV shows and movies in its rankings. PoolmanThe popularity of is incredibly impressive considering the film is competing with some of the streamer’s major originals.
In fact, the latest seasons of The young And Clarkson’s Farm, new show My Lady Jane and current documentary series I am: Celine DionJaw Poolman is the most viewed video that is not the streamer’s original. It even ranks above the smash hit Stand out, Generation V (which is the latest season of The youngwhose spin-off it is) and another current documentary Federer: Twelve final days.
This means that British cinema fans at home really watched Poolman at full strength. They don’t seem to enjoy the film any more than previous viewers, as there isn’t a single new audience review above one star on Rotten Tomatoes (at least since the film came out on Prime), but they’re clearly still watching it.
If you are a fan of Chris Pine and his crime thrillers but don’t want to watch a film with such a bad rating, there is an alternative. The 2022 film All old knives Pine plays alongside Thandiwe Newton, and while it’s Rotten Tomatoes reviews aren’t stellar, it’s certainly better than Poolman.
