Issues change for Darren — a hopeless conspiracy theorist who will get concepts for a proposed Los Angeles trolley system from “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?” — when a femme fatale (DeWanda Smart) asks him for his assist in uncovering a conspiracy involving the council president (Tobolowski), the stealing of water, and corrupt businessmen.
“Poolman” tries to be not only a love letter to town of Los Angeles, however a love letter to films concerning the metropolis, with direct references to each nice crime L.A. film, from “Chinatown,” to “The Lengthy Goodbye” — characters point out the movies, Darren actually watches “Chinatown” on VHS, and nearly each character within the movie is in some way associated to Hollywood, with most characters having backgrounds in performing.
The issue is that the movie has little extra to supply than these references. After the primary 10 minutes, the “Chinatown” meets “Large Lebowski” schtick wears off, and the remainder of “Poolman” is little greater than a stretched-out “SNL” skit that wears its idea too skinny. The thriller of Pine and Ian Gotler’s script is convoluted with out being stunning or fascinating, with each character talking in riddles that lead nowhere.
Worse but, regardless of an important ensemble of actors and characters that act like cartoons, none of them are significantly humorous. Pine embodies his Zen pool cleaner to nice impact, however there’s little substance to the character aside from, nicely, he is performed by Chris Pine. If there’s one saving grace is that “Poolman” seems to be somewhat good, with the manufacturing design discovering cool methods to painting Los Angeles and its bizarre characters — Darren’s wardrobe, his brief shorts specifically, do a number of the heavy lifting in presenting a picture of who this man is. However none of this is sufficient to make the film float.
/Movie Score: 5 out of 10
