The Swimmer (1968)

I had no idea they'd made a movie of The Swimmer. But I'll watch anything with Burt Lancaster in it. My goodness, Lancaster is mid-50s and he's in great shape. He took swimming lessons for this role but he looks like a complete natural. Although over-baked in some regards - the gushy music, the ending, the zooms, the montages - this still drew me in. Since nobody else has mentioned her I have to give props to Janice Rule's performance as Shirley. That was the most affecting scene to me. She was dynamite.

When I see this picture I think about the Led Zeppelin song Dazed and Confused. There's a lyric that reads ,"Don't know were your going,don't know where you've been." Out of the brush and entering common ground of either Westchester or Greenwich, Connecticut Ned Merrill (Bert Lancaster) tall, muscular and lean wearing a smile and a black bathing suit appears. I figure it's the weekend in July with so many pool parties going on at the same time. Ned travels the Lucinda trail named after his Wife as he figures that if he swims across each pool in the immediate valley from one yard to the next he'll reach his stately home by evening. Each visit from each gathering adds a clue to Ned's Past. Need speaks fondly of his family and his two daughters playing Tennis. In the beginning Ned is greeted warmly as we meet a cavalcade of TV familiars. Bill "Mona" Fiore, Bernie "Starsky and Hutch " Hamilton, Jan "Palmolive manicurist" Miner, Dolph "Give Me A Break" Sweet who isn't very Sweet to Ned and an eager Joan Rivers playing a serious role in this story of wonderment. There is a tender moment in this film as Ned befriends a lonely boy and prevents a terrible mishap. Not one of the greatest films but it is thought provoking and makes you wonder who the real Ned Merrill is. A movie you'll watch again and again but get ready to throw Ned a lifesaver.

EVERYONE has films that for some strange reason, seemingly completely out of sync with one's age and place and station in life at the time, resonate and then some, impacting that person for years to come.For me, the two that stand out in that regard are 1968's "The Swimmer" and 1973's "Save the Tiger," both dark character studies dealing with morality, amorality and the twists and turns of complex lives not always so well lived by their middle-aged characters.Why I identified with these characters at such an early age myself I have no idea, only that their serpentine screen dilemmas provided a kind of moral road map in the real world, at least for me, and did their jobs as cinematic storytellers in staying with me all these years, still."The Swimmer," taken from a short story by John Cheever, stars Burt Lancaster as Neddy, an upper-class Connecticut man whom we find lounging poolside with friends in an affluent suburb.It occurs to him that he can "swim home" by visiting pools of friends and acquaintances, a route that he sees as a kind of "river."As the man swims, we begin to understand more and more about his life, or think we do, and he evolves through conversations, confrontations and offhand comments, until he winds up ingloriously at a public pool and, finally, standing shivering in the pouring rain before the gates of his mansion in one of filmdom's most surprising endings.Many fascinating characters people the film, played by many a recognizable face, including Joan Rivers (yes, that Joan Rivers), John Garfield Jr. (son of the great noir star), Janice Rule, Marge Champion (dancer-choreographer Gower Champion's better half), Kim Hunter and Janet Landgard.The film was directed by Frank Perry (with some scenes overseen by Robert Redford's frequent collaborator, Sydney Pollack, who is uncredited), with a screenplay by Perry's wife, Eleanor."Save the Tiger" stars Jack Lemmon as Harry Stoner, a clothing manufacturer who is undergoing the loss of youthful idealism as he weighs whether or not to pay an arsonist to torch his factory so he can survive financially through the insurance settlement. His friend and business partner is played by an extraordinarily effective Jack Gilford, a rubber-faced actor with the saddest eyes you'll ever see best known to a generation as the Cracker Jack man.Like Lancaster's Neddy in "The Swimmer," Lemmon's Stoner in "Tiger" is undergoing more than an evolution, but a breakdown, not only emotionally, but spiritually as well. Each story is a type of first-person morality play as seen through the eyes of these central characters.Lemmon won the best actor Oscar for his performance (beating out, among others, Redford, for his turn in "The Sting"), and the film was voted best drama by the Writers Guild of America.Both films seem to have evaporated into the mists of time, little remembered or considered by generations that came after.But they've stayed with me, I like to think because they were both beautifully rendered and had something worthwhile to say, expressing it uniquely and well.If you're in the mood for thought-provoking character studies that will stay with you long after viewing, and for all the right reasons, I recommend giving them a look.

This film has more of "stage play" look to it than most films. It is a sort of odyssey of one character alone, with the other characters simply appearing in short bursts.Lancaster plays a man who is a big of a braggart, thinking he can "swim" home to the other side of town, on land, by borrowing everyone else's pools to do a lap.It's a very pompous statement that immediately sets one against his character, but along the way he shows us that he isn't really as pompous as he is simple. He really isn't a big brain, but has tasted much success. He isn't an evil character by any means, nor a hero, just a very simple man.He is as "gray" as a character can be. He doesn't want to harm anyone, and in his heart he thinks he can do good, but the fact is he is more helpless and useless than he realizes.He owes most of the people money or favors whom he visits, and doesn't seem to know how little they think of him. He's had a good life, and has had excellent health. It's hard to say he "wasted" it, because he more or less just went along life for the ride, with an attitude of live and let live.At times his pompous nature turns to a "superior" feeling, however. Not in a dangerous way, but still in a way that means he wants success at the expense of others.This isn't to defend him. Nor to attack him. He's not the man I would want to lead my work crew, but he is okay in the work crew.