The Swimmer (1968 film)

The Swimmer
theatrical poster
Directed by	Frank Perry Sydney Pollack (uncredited scenes)
Written by	Eleanor Perry
Produced by	Frank Perry Roger Lewis Sam Spiegel (uncredited)
Starring	Burt Lancaster
Cinematography	David L. Quaid
Edited by	Sidney Katz Carl Lerner Pat Somerset
Music by	Marvin Hamlisch
Production company	Horizon Pictures
Distributed by	Columbia Pictures Grindhouse Releasing / Box Office Spectaculars (Blu-ray/DVD)
Release date	May 15, 1968 (1968-05-15) (US)
Running time	95 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

The Swimmer is a 1968 American surreal drama starring Burt Lancaster with Janet Landgard and Janice Rule in featured roles. The film was written and directed by the Academy Award-nominated couple, Eleanor Perry (screenplay adaptation) and Frank Perry (director). The allegorical story is based on the 1964 short story "The Swimmer" by John Cheever.

Plot

On a sunny day in an affluent suburb in Connecticut, a fit and tanned middle-aged man in a bathing suit, Ned Merrill (Burt Lancaster), drops by a pool party being held by friends. They offer him a cocktail while nursing hangovers from the night before. As they share stories, Ned realizes that there is a series of swimming pools that form a "river" to his house, making it possible for him to "swim" his way home. Ned dives into the pool, emerging at the other end and beginning his journey. Ned's behavior perplexes his friends, who know things about his recent past he seems to have forgotten.

As Ned travels he encounters other neighbors. He meets 20-year-old Julie (Janet Landgard), who used to babysit a daughter, and reveals his idea to her; she joins him. Together, they have several experiences, including crashing another pool party and sipping champagne. While chatting in the forest, Julie reveals that she had a school girl crush on Ned, who begins talking about how he will protect her, making plans for the two of them. Discomfited, Julie runs away.

The neighborhood is full of judgmental well-heeled people intent on one-upsmanship, and Ned continues to be confronted by reminders that his past was not always as he remembers it.

Ned meets a wealthy older couple, unbothered by his eccentric behavior but also unimpressed by his posturing, and a lonely young boy, who Ned spends a short time with. He fails to make any real connection with the people he meets, being obsessed with his journey, and becoming increasingly out of touch with reality.

Ned carries on with his plan. He walks into another party where the hostess, who seems to have had a past encounter with him, playfully calls him a "party crasher". He encounters there a bubbly girl, Joan (Joan Rivers), who does not know him. Ned asks her to join him, and Joan is intrigued until she is warned off by a friend. Ned jumps into the pool, grabbing the attention of the guests. When he gets out of the water, he notices a cart that is being used to serve hot dogs used to be his. Ned gets into a spat with the homeowner, who says he bought it at a white elephant sale.

Ned then shows up at the backyard pool of Shirley Abbott (Janice Rule), a stage actress with whom he had an affair several years earlier. His warm memories of their time together are not in agreement with her own experience of having been the other woman. Unable to reconcile his feelings with the pain he has caused, Ned wades into the deep end of the pool.

Ned continues on, winding up at a crowded public swimming pool. He is confronted by local shopkeepers who ask him, "How do you like our water?" and ask him when he will settle his unpaid bills. When some of them let loose vicious comments about his wife's snobbish tastes and his out-of-control daughter's recent troubles with the law, it is too much for Ned and he flees.

As the sun goes down, a shivering, limping Ned staggers home, finding his house locked and deserted, as rain pours down.

Cast

• Burt Lancaster as Ned Merrill
• Janet Landgard as Julie Ann Hooper
• Janice Rule as Shirley Abbott
• Joan Rivers as Joan
• Tony Bickley as Donald Westerhazy
• Marge Champion as Peggy Forsburgh
• Kim Hunter as Betty Graham
• Nancy Cushman as Mrs. Halloran (nudist)
• Bill Fiore as Howie Hunsacker
• David Garfield as Ticket seller
• Rose Gregorio as Sylvia Finney
• Charles Drake as Howard Graham
• Bernie Hamilton as Halloran's chauffeur

• House Jameson as Chester Halloran (nudist)
• Jimmy Joyce as Jack Finney
• Michael Kearney as Kevin Gilmartin Jr.
• Richard McMurray as Stu Forsburgh
• Jan Miner as Lillian Hunsacker
• Diana Muldaur as Cynthia
• Keri Oleson as Vernon Hooper
• Cornelia Otis Skinner as Mrs. Hammar
• Dolph Sweet as Henry Biswanger
• Louise Troy as Grace Biswanger
• Diana Van der Vlis as Helen Westerhazy

Cast notes

• David Garfield was the son of actor John Garfield, and is billed as "John Garfield Jr."
• Janice Rule replaced Barbara Loden in the part of Shirley Abbott
• The Swimmer was actress and comedienne Joan Rivers' film debut. Her short scene took more time than necessary to shoot, which she blamed on Lancaster, writing in her autobiography that, "He redirected every line... Frank (Perry) wanted a happy girl who then got hurt. Lancaster was going to be Mr. Wonderful who came up against a mean bitch, and was right not to go off with her. Trying to please both men, I was going back and forth between line readings, and nothing made sense."

Production

The Swimmer was produced by Sam Spiegel (The Bridge on the River Kwai, Lawrence of Arabia), who ultimately removed his name from the film (although the logo of the company he headed, Horizon Pictures, remains). It was filmed largely on location in Westport, Connecticut, hometown of director Frank Perry. Production took place during the summer of 1966, but the film was not released until 1968.

Although he was a trained athlete, star Burt Lancaster had a secret fear of the water, and took swimming lessons with UCLA swim coach, Bob Horn, to prepare for the film.

According to Joan Rivers, Lancaster and Perry had confrontations on the set. Frank Perry was ultimately fired by Sam Spiegel sometime after the first cut of the film was screened. The producers then brought in Lancaster's good friend, the young director Sydney Pollack. Pollack reportedly reshot several transitions and scenes, including the Shirley Abbot scene which was entirely recast with Janice Rule now playing the part that was originally played by Barbara Loden. According to Lancaster, when the film needed an additional day of shooting, he paid $10,000 for it out of his own pocket.

After working on several popular television series, the film was Janet Landgard's first featured cinematic role. It also features cameos by Kim Hunter, Cornelia Otis Skinner, Joan Rivers, and Diana Muldaur, among others.

Soundtrack

Untitled

All the pieces were composed by first-time film composer, 24-year-old Marvin Hamlisch and were orchestrated by Leo Shuken and Jack Hayes. The musical score has dramatic passages for a small orchestra along with a mid-1960s pop sound. Hamlisch got the job after producer Sam Spiegel hired him to play the piano at one of Spiegel's legendary parties. The soundtrack album was released in 2006 by Film Score Monthly.

Response

The initial box office response to the film was "lackluster" but the critical response has been better in recent years, with the film gaining a cult film status. The film critic Roger Ebert called The Swimmer "a strange, stylized work, a brilliant and disturbing one." Vincent Canby in the New York Times wrote "Although literal in style, the film has the shape of an open-ended hallucination. It is a grim, disturbing and sometimes funny view of a very small, very special segment of upper-middle-class American life", but Variety said "a lot of people are not going to understand this film; many will loathe it; others will be moved deeply. Its detractors will be most vocal; its supporters will not have high-powered counter-arguments."

Upon reviewing the 2014 Grindhouse Releasing Blu-ray restoration, Brian Orndorf of Blu-ray.com gave the release “FIVE STARS! Continues Grindhouse’s exemplary work in the BD realm, with a gorgeous filmic offering,” commenting that Burt Lancaster gives a, “deeply felt, gut-rot performance … and communicates every emotional beat with perfection… 1968's "The Swimmer" is a dream and a nightmare rolled into a deceptively simple mission of memory evasion. It's a strange picture, but engrossingly so, taking the viewer on a journey of self-delusion and nostalgia that gradually exposes a richly tortured main character as he attempts to immerse himself in a life that's no longer available to him.” Reviewing the 2014 Blu-ray release, Ain't It Cool News reviewer Harry Knowles commented, “A Great Weird F-cking Movie! This is also Burt Lancaster’s journey to... The Twilight Zone. I would have killed for a Rod Serling intro to this movie... It would be one of the greatest things of all time!... Lancaster begins this movie with all the charm and bravura of Elmer Gantry... and he’s gonna slowly, pool after pool, lap after lap, he’s going to wash that ego clean away, he’s going to hear the truth and face the unimaginable. And it is friggin brilliant!... It is fascinating! Spectacular film!”

The aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes gives the film an approval rating of 100%.

Home media

The Swimmer was originally released on DVD in 2003 and had been in "home video limbo" since, having drifted out of print in recent years. The initial 2003 release was considered a, “ho-hum looking widescreen transfer... (with) a number of imperfections (including grain and dirt aplenty),” the image suffering from, ”a true lack of detail and bleeding colors... this (2003 DVD) edition of The Swimmer is an empty pool—the only supplements fans can dive into are a few theatrical trailers for various Columbia titles”

In March 2014, Grindhouse Releasing/Box Office released The Swimmer on Blu-ray in high definition. The 2014 Blu-ray/DVD combo pack received positive reviews, with Blu-ray.com giving it a rare “FIVE STARS!” “Grindhouse have been establishing themselves as the Criterion of offbeat cinema... They have taken a previously rare, and quite obscure, title and given it the special edition treatment that its fans have long dreamt of. The two-disc DVD/Blu-ray combo pack is attractively packaged and is stuffed to the gills with extras, but first things first: the film itself looks stunning in a new high definition, 1.85/16x9 transfer.”

Extras on the release include a five part documentary The Story of the Swimmer which includes comments from surviving production and cast members including Janet Landgard, Joan Rivers, Joanna Lancaster (Burt Lancaster’s daughter), Marge Champion, Michael Hertzberg and Ted Zachary (the film’s first and second assistant directors), Bob Horn (UCLA swim coach and Lancaster’s trainer), and archival interviews with composer Marvin Hamlisch and the film’s editor Sidney Katz, A.C.E.. Reviewer Troy Howarth of Eccentric Cinema remarked, “It's a brilliant piece of work by editor/director Chris Innis and it definitely raises the bar of what one can expect with such retrospective featurettes.” Brian Orndorf of Blu-ray.com commented, The Story of The Swimmer (148:53, HD) is a miraculous five-part documentary from Innis that dissects the feature in full, with specific attention to Lancaster's star power and the BTS strife that almost prevented the movie from being released… the candor put forth here is outstanding, generating a riveting tale of a Hollywood tug of war, with evidence in the form of letters and quotes, painting a portrait of an ambitious production that was derailed by control issues, leading to Perry's dismissal, extensive reshoots from Sydney Pollack, and a two-year release delay. It's an exhaustive documentary, but there's never a dull moment.”

Also included in the 2014 Blu-ray release is title sequence outtakes, Frank Perry’s storyboards, production stills (including those documenting Barbara Loden’s deleted scene), trailers, TV spots, an audio recording of author John Cheever reading the original short story The Swimmer, as well as a 12-page color booklet with essays by filmmaker Stuart Gordon and Innis. The cover sleeve comes with new cover art from illustrator Glen Orbik (Stephen King’s Joyland). There is also a separate 2013 interview with Marge Champion.

References

Notes

External links

• The Swimmer at IMDb