Edinburgh College of Art graduate, my contemporary, Noo Yawk cartoonist and regular reader Simon Fraser nominates this extract of heart-thumping joy from Frank Perry’s unique John Cheever 1968 adaptation, THE SWIMMER.
“I’m not sure, but I think there’s a scene in ‘The Swimmer’ with Burt
Lancaster, when he races a horse on foot. Now that’s a man enjoying
being alive. Burt was good at being alive.”
Is true. And he was a fine figure of a fellow at fifty-five!
Burt always moved well. His experience as an acrobat informs his acting, and he trusted in the physical. I love that story of John Frankenheimer giving him a long, involved psychological piece of direction, and Burt saying “Ah, what the hell, I’ll just give it the grin.”
Apart from his acrobatics, in his early days Burt also worked as a clerk in a department store, selling lingerie. I bet he shifted a lot of pants.
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Cinematographer David Quaid doesn’t seem to have shot very much. I have his other main film, made the same year as this: PRETTY POISON. That must have been a good year. I love all the sixties glamour stuff he does in this film, with diffusion, starburst filters, the full panoply of Sunday Supplement gloss, done without a trace of irony. Stunningly beautiful — I sort of feel that the more late 60s US films tried to be modern, the more old-fashioned they appeared — but I don’t necessarily condemn them for it. It’s a lovely effect at times, as in this film, which is very moving and packed with incredible actresses too.
I wonder what the effect would be if somebody put together a Frank Perry retrospective (maybe it’s already happened). He made quite a few distinguished films which, individually, have had plenty written about them, but I don’t get the impression he’s been studied much as an auteur. I have a tape Perry’s last film, ON THE BRIDGE, an autobiographical documentary about his fight against cancer, which I copied from the Lindsay Anderson Collection — one of these days, when I’m feeling sturdy enough, I must watch it.
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Oh, apparently Sidney Pollack did some uncredited directing on this, but I don’t know what the story behind that is. However, I’ve been meaning to post some pretty frame grabs from what is actually both Lancaster and Pollack’s next film: CASTLE KEEP. I’m not sure it’s any kind of great movie, but it has some stunning images, decorated with some of the same lovely ‘sixties tics as THE SWIMMER.
shadowplay 