For a movie with “slash” in the title. AQUASLASH has to be one of the tamest, most drawn out and boring slasher films I’ve ever seen. An incredibly promising and original premise is watered down (pun intended) by an incredibly mundane script and poor acting. It’s remarkable that a film like AQUASLASH gets made nowadays, and looks as good as it does — when in reality the content is B- level camp at best.

The concept, which is incredibly loosely presented to begin with, is that 35 years ago a series of murders occurred at Wet Valley water park. The whole event is presented in an introductory flashback scene, which features the most interesting kills of the film, but is so clouded in mystery that folks in town sometimes doubt it even happened… maybe it’s just urban legend. Well, now Wet Valley is the graduation party hot spot, and an entire high school class crowds the park and makes it their own. Drugs, drinking, sex – it’s Camp Crystal Lake in a water park. There’s some bizarre shenanigans going on between the high schoolers and the owners of the water park – but we’ll get back to that later in the review. Ultimately the kids are living their “best lives”, and living it up.

Filled in with fluff for about 45 minutes, the only other real plot point of the story comes in at 55 minutes in to this incredibly short 70 minute feature, when, as is unfortunately revealed by the trailer, a water slide race turns deadly. Two massive blades cross in one of the slides, and what starts out as good clean All-American fun turns into a bloodbath.

It’s honestly hard for me to overstate how terribly mediocre this film was. It’s difficult to even say it’s “bad” – as calling it bad would imply there was enough substance to love or hate. A myriad of underdeveloped and uninteresting characters tell a completely disinteresting story – which doesn’t really have a culmination or reveal to make it worth anything. As mentioned, it’s only 70 minutes long and even that seems to drag massively, especially in the middle section of the film. And once the ending rolls around there hasn’t been enough lead up to keep the viewer invested – and it’s all left so open ended that there’s no reason to stay invested at all.

As so often is the case in these kinds of “bad horror” films, AQUASLASH is fraught with bad stereotypes, questionable morals, and flat out sexism and racism. The only black character is a degenerate who threatens violence every time someone gets on his bad side, who also happens to have been held back a grade or two. The girls are all portrayed as dumb, shallow, and easily manipulated by sex and power. There’s some very wishy washy LGBT representation – if you can call it that – mostly alluding to gayness in a joking, nearly bullying way. It’s all the worst parts of middle school, in a high school uniform. Throw on top of that garbage fire the terrible couple who owns the park, and their highly questionable relationship with the teens, and it’s just a cluster of bad representation and bad decisions. Films like AQUASLASH seem to cater to the lowest sense of humor and higher consciousness – and it’s disappointing they can still be made in our modern, “woke” times.

AQUASLASH was barely worth tuning in to. Boring kills turned this slasher into a mediocre high school drama, and the valley girl deep in my heart simply said – gag me with a spoon.

1/10 stars



Aquaslash
RATING: UR
Runtime: 1 Hr. 20 Mins.
Directed By:
Renauld Gaulthier
Written By:
Renauld Gaulthier

About the Author

Makeup Artist, Monster Maker, Educator, Producer, Haunt-lover, and all around Halloween freak. When Miranda isn't watching horror films, she's making them happen. When she's not doing either of those things, she's probably dreaming about them. Or baking cookies.