Pretend Play Toys

The Weird And Wonderful World Of Movie Pool Parties

Take a quick look through your comedy DVD collection and I bet you’ll soon see the Swimming pool pumps being turned on for a quick pool party. Where would frathouse and other sub-genres be without the pool party scene? Here are three of the best.

Caddyshack

It’s not Hollywood’s finest moment of maturity, but we’ll soon admit that it’s completely hilarious. A poolside fight over a chocolate bar leads to a mass panic when it flies into the pool and starts floating like a you-know-what. Not the nicest of pool accessories. The scene clearly spoofs the panic on the beach in Jaws, but comes back for a typically unsettling pay off. When the pool is later drained, Bill Murray’s character Carl Spackler enjoys a nutty snack.

Jesus Christ Superstar

The musical on which it’s based is a bizarre enough reinterpretation of the Easter story, but this rock-opera movie’s crowning moment is its utterly off the wall poolside detour with King Herod. The film version sees a bare-chested, oiled Herod lounging around with a group of men and women in swimwear and afro-wigs. Maybe they should check what’s in the Swimming Pool Chemicals. Productions at all levels usually use this version as the blueprint. Those who’ve ever been in a school production of the play will be familiar with the reception the song usually gets for a particularly camp classmate. Lloyd Webber’s rhyming is also at its most diabolical: ‘Prove to me that you’re no fool, walk across my swimming pool’.

Anchorman

Similarly extravagant and filled with campy machismo, this 70′s Field-Reporter send-up put the pool-party centre stage as the venue for the terminally self-unaware. Endlessly quotable, it’s a celebration of all things party animal, not least because so many modern comedy frat-boys are on board. Will Ferrell, Vince Vaughn, Luke Wilson, Ben Stiller and Jack Black are all in the film, five members of the so called ‘frat pack’ of regular, top-grossing collaborators. Add in names like Seth Rogen and Steve Carell and you’ve got yourself one hell of a Hollywood fancy dress party.