The Swimmer
1968 Directed by Frank Perry, Sydney Pollack
Synopsis
When you talk about "The Swimmer" will you talk about yourself?
Neddy Merrill has been away for most of the Summer. He reappears at a friends pool. As they talk, someone notices that there are pools spanning the entire valley. He decided to jog from pool to pool to swim the whole valley. As he stops in each pool his interactions tell his life story.
Cast
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I'd have to say I preferred John Cheever's short story to this and would highly recommend it. While my sentiment for the movie doesn't quite match up for the story, I still thoroughly enjoyed it. In the short story I felt a bit sad for him, where in the movie I sympathized more with the neighbors of the swimmer.
http://letterboxd.com/eli12345/list/march-movie-madness/detail/
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Another film by Frank Perry that should be in a boxed set with his others. Pay attention "Powers that Be"! It has wonderful autumnal location photography . Shot in a woodsy tony suburb in New England . And based on one of John Cheever's best tales. Lancaster is at his best as a former golden boy-now suffering a severe mid-life crisis. You truly feel for him in his confusion and want him to come out ok . But circumstances and snooty friends and neighbors all seem to have it in for him at every turn . They also have the cold hard truth about him too , so they are privy to more info than we are. So we're left…
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Based on John Cheever’s short story about a man “swimming” his way home by following a trail of pools in his upper class suburban neighbourhood. At each pool he meets different people and goes through a gamut of human experience. It shouldn’t work, but it does, and retains much of its avant-garde spirit as Burt Lancaster swims across the county. Each encounter reveals a piece of his personality, until the tragic story of his life is laid bare. Excellent.
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Whoever programs the SBS late movie is clearly a huge fan of this one, because it's not the third time I've seen it on that channel. Not that I'm complaining mind you, because this is a pure work of brilliance — Lancaster here is at his finest, and this part-existential-drama/part surrealist-romp-through-upper-class-New-England-or-somewhere-like-that is something to behold
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The Swimmer, based on a Cheever story, is an ideal vehicle for Burt Lancaster's virile yet sensitive acting style. The Swimmer is an actor's movie and the man at the center of this film was more than up for the job. Unlike today's fashion plate actors, this performance is fearless and real. This one is a little gem.
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A really strong performance from Burt Lancaster in this riddle of the sphinx allegorical tale based on a short story by John Cheever. The cinematography presents a dreamlike landscape where Lancaster's hopelessly optimistic character decides to swim home across Westchester County via a series of private and public swimming pools. As he goes, his optimism fades as attitudes towards him change and his story is slowly revealed.
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burt lancaster just gets increasingly colder and cant find his shirt
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Surrealism, Burt Lancaster...and a lot of swimming pools. Look out for a young Joan Rivers in her film debut.
Tame by today's standards but an interesting metaphor on the midlife crisis.
An interesting analysis of the story can be found here: rebekahnydam.hubpages.com/hub/Drowning-in-the-Suburbs-The-Swimmer-by-John-Cheever -
I'd have to say I preferred John Cheever's short story to this and would highly recommend it. While my sentiment for the movie doesn't quite match up for the story, I still thoroughly enjoyed it. In the short story I felt a bit sad for him, where in the movie I sympathized more with the neighbors of the swimmer.
http://letterboxd.com/eli12345/list/march-movie-madness/detail/
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Whoever programs the SBS late movie is clearly a huge fan of this one, because it's not the third time I've seen it on that channel. Not that I'm complaining mind you, because this is a pure work of brilliance — Lancaster here is at his finest, and this part-existential-drama/part surrealist-romp-through-upper-class-New-England-or-somewhere-like-that is something to behold
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The Swimmer, based on a Cheever story, is an ideal vehicle for Burt Lancaster's virile yet sensitive acting style. The Swimmer is an actor's movie and the man at the center of this film was more than up for the job. Unlike today's fashion plate actors, this performance is fearless and real. This one is a little gem.
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A really strong performance from Burt Lancaster in this riddle of the sphinx allegorical tale based on a short story by John Cheever. The cinematography presents a dreamlike landscape where Lancaster's hopelessly optimistic character decides to swim home across Westchester County via a series of private and public swimming pools. As he goes, his optimism fades as attitudes towards him change and his story is slowly revealed.
-
Another film by Frank Perry that should be in a boxed set with his others. Pay attention "Powers that Be"! It has wonderful autumnal location photography . Shot in a woodsy tony suburb in New England . And based on one of John Cheever's best tales. Lancaster is at his best as a former golden boy-now suffering a severe mid-life crisis. You truly feel for him in his confusion and want him to come out ok . But circumstances and snooty friends and neighbors all seem to have it in for him at every turn . They also have the cold hard truth about him too , so they are privy to more info than we are. So we're left…
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One of the strangest films I've ever seen. Witness a man in meltdown. Strangely compelling
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Based on John Cheever’s short story about a man “swimming” his way home by following a trail of pools in his upper class suburban neighbourhood. At each pool he meets different people and goes through a gamut of human experience. It shouldn’t work, but it does, and retains much of its avant-garde spirit as Burt Lancaster swims across the county. Each encounter reveals a piece of his personality, until the tragic story of his life is laid bare. Excellent.