An Exercise In Nonsense

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

The problem is that the river, dubbed "The Lucinda" after his wife by the central character, Neddy Merrill (Burt Lancaster), is a seriously broken and disrupted waterway that becomes increasingly unnavigable and more treacherous as the story proceeds. At first, Neddy 's relationship with his affluent Fairfield County neighborhood seems cordial enough but then it gradually deteriorates as the viewer observes that Neddy's standing in his community is not at all as it first appears. Even at the film's tragic end, we still aren't quite sure what it was that brought Neddy to financial, emotional, and spiritual ruin. The one positive aspect is that he is still physically as fit as a fiddle, having appeared for ninety minutes in nothing other than a skimpy, speedo-like swimsuit and, at one point, emerging in nothing at all when he visits a couple of nudist friends. If he wasn't going to reveal it all, why bother removing his suit in the first place? I know. It was too much for 1968, but Lancaster probably would have done it if he had the opportunity. Why the heck not at that point in his stunningly successful career? He was already on the top of the Hollywood world and deservedly so.With this viewing, I began thinking, as other reviewers suggest, that Neddy's unique adventure was nothing more than a horrible nightmare about failure itself. The only problem is that he didn't awaken at the end as Amy Irving gratefully did in the horror classic "Carrie". In this case, I am regrettably convinced that Neddy's adventure through the suburban swimming pools of Fairfield County was real and that his increasingly hostile encounters with his neighbors were not only in his imagination. That is what makes the film even more tragic--that Neddy is never freed from the humiliation and horror of his ordeal, as I so much want him to be. Unfortunately, it isn't until the end of the journey when he discovers the unbearable truth at long last."If you make believe hard enough that something is true, it's true for you," he advises the young boy with the empty swimming pool. These words reveal more than any others the disastrous state of denial and the state of mental breakdown that Neddy has reached. The complex and troubling predicament of the central character was very effectively augmented by the musical score of Marvin Hamlisch, his very first film composition. Burt Lancaster was so dedicated to this production that he paid $10,000 out of his own pocket, a sizeable sum in 1966, to finish the film. He considered this to be among the best films of his long, diverse career, and I think that I agree with him.No matter what the causes of Neddy Merrill's downfall actually might have been, he is only a human being, regardless of how flawed, as we all are, and we have nothing but compassion for him.

Burt Lancaster as the world's most buff 55-year-old. He spends the entire movie in a pair of swimming trunks. A cross-section of 60s supporting players populate his odyssey through the swimming pools of the upper crust of Connecticut. The episodic structure leads to some relatively weak passages, but the music and Burt's dynamic, charismatic Candide-like ad executive keep things moving at a jaunty pace. Janice Rule is inhumanly sexy in a small, but pivotal role. Adapted from a John Cheever New Yorker short story, and a case study in delusion and denial."This is my hot dog wagon."

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.

Neddy Merrill (Burt Lancaster) has been gone for some time. He takes a swim in a neighbor's pool. Friends start to gather and everybody is happy to see him. When somebody points out some of the great pools in the neighborhood, Neddy decides to swim the various pools until he reaches his home. He vows to swim home. Along the way, he invites his daughter's former babysitter Julie Ann Hooper (Janet Landgard), he meets friend who are polite, people who are angry at him and a former love.This is journey not only through the neighborhood but into his interior. All the small talk is covering for something tragic. It's obvious that he is trying to escape reality but all his friends talk in a circle. He is always looking towards the sky. There is something disturbing that nobody is willing to put a voice to. Burt Lancaster is brilliant and perfect. The visuals are mostly sunny. There is usually a happy but unsettled disposition. The tone and Lancaster make this a great movie.