Based on the short story by John Cheever (1964), The Swimmer (1968) is a surrealist drama that has achieved cult status since its release. However, it was a production that was fraught with creative differences that included the credited director (Frank Perry) fired before the final reshoots were concluded and much of the supporting cast replaced to be then directed by an uncredited Sydney Pollack. The documentary The Story of the Swimmer (2014) which details the film’s production is nearly 50 minutes longer than the original release itself! And yet, Burt Lancaster considered the film one of the finest of his career, one that he put up his own money (supposedly $10,000) to pay for the final day of shooting. Legendary for maintaining his athletic physique throughout his career, Lancaster is in Olympian form at age 52 where his only costume is swimming trunks.

As seasons fade into the next, it is natural to look back on the highlights of those times with nostalgia. Summer, for instance, is always associated with excitement and energy. But if those same sentiments are also found in the other seasons, does that make the idea of summer, truly a time period due to its promise of heat, also a fantasy?

Ned Merrill (Lancaster) in The Swimmer is a character that fully clings to the fantasy of eternal vitality and domestic bliss as he attempts to travel home by way of his neighbors’ private pools. The film begins with sounds of someone walking through the New York forest (actually filmed in Connecticut) as elegiac music matches the tone of falling leaves. Ned is greeted warmly by the first several sets of neighbors that he will encounter that day, where obvious flirtations with his friends’ wives (kissing feet and slapping butts) and terms of endearment (“ole son of a gun”) reveal a sincere and joyous acceptance of a man who does not seem to acknowledge the actual state of his current life situation. Instead, Ned accepts alcoholic beverages as easily as he strides into neighbors’ backyards to swim in their pools. The audience knows quickly that something is amiss from the parting looks of his friends anytime Ned’s wife and daughters are mentioned. And yet, Ned insists that all is well in his life; so well in fact that he will swim home across the “river of sapphire pools” that he names the “Lucinda River” in tribute to his wife. When asked why attempt such a feat of physical endurance, the virile Ned confidently replies, “Why not, when the world is so generously supplied with water?”

Throughout the film, Ned constantly invites others to join him on his journey, especially women. He specifically describes the physical activity as “portaging.” As Ned is traveling with only his swimming trunks, one questions what he is carrying with him on his journey. Certainly a belief in his own virility as Ned describes himself as a “very special human being, noble and splendid.” But as Ned continues on in his journey, the cracks in his blissful fantasy begin to show more and more. He is a character that is out of season as he is surprised to see the landscape changing from its annual summer allure to the sight of local, marigold flowers that he thought “bloom later.” He is also out of time as well as he does not recollect the recent misfortunes of others, in particular the life-threatening injury to one friend that he “never even called…at the hospital.” Harsh reality is not what Ned envisions in his day-long quest for adventure, so he portages on, later challenging a horse to a race and jumping hurdles with his children’s former babysitter (now all grown up).

Ned yearns for others to make good on their fantasies. When he learns that Julie the Babysitter (Janet Landgard) had a childhood crush on him, thinking of him as “a god”, Ned offers her to consummate that dream. The reality of his offer frightens Julie, forcing her to run away from Ned. Later, he encounters Kevin (Michael Kearney), a boy selling lemonade who does not know how to swim. Naturally, The Swimmer sets out to teach the boy how to do so, all in a drained pool. When Kevin is dubious of the instruction, Ned states, “If you make believe hard enough that something is true, then it is true for you.” When Ned later sees the boy jumping up and down on the diving board he panics and rushes back to Kevin to needlessly console him. Ned fears he has convinced Kevin that diving into an empty pool is the same as swimming in one. Here, Ned’s fantasizing is a danger to others.

Private swimming pools are a symbol of class in the community that The Swimmer depicts, and Ned takes advantage of that community’s privileged perks. For instance, he orders drinks freely from uniformed bartenders that staff all of the parties he voyages through. Many of the bartenders he knows on a first-name basis, revealing that the “suburban stud” of the community is friendly with both residents and hired help. The only time that Ned does not recognize a paid worker is due to his crisis of lost time when he mistakenly addresses the new, African-American chauffeur by his predecessor’s name. The Chauffeur (Bernie Hamilton) shrugs off the mistake but does caustically conclude Ned’s compliments that his personage must contain “a natural sense of rhythm,” a moment in which The Swimmer further critiques the community through the lens of race. This is a community of Caucasian wealth and black servitude.

The privilege of this community is further displayed by the fact that most of the residents that Ned encounters on his quest are not swimming and do not even regularly use the pools they own. Instead, the residents brag about their pool filters that “filter 99.99.99 percent of all solid matter.” At a later pool party that features a covered roof that is “30,000 thousand pounds structured aluminum and clear plastic”, Ned silences the dancing partygoers by actually diving into the pool, breaking a social norm of that community’s behavior. When Ned spies a rolling hot dog cart that his family once owned, Ned rages in confusion on how it got there, first demanding its return and later willing to buy it back. The moment further shows the cracks in Ned’s fantasy that such personal possessions are no longer his. His attempt to reclaim the hot dog cart is denied, and Ned is quickly thrown out of the party, a stark contrast to the friendly greeting that he received by different neighbors at the beginning of the film. Like the filtered pool water that he swims in, Ned also filters out reality.

The last private pool that Ned encounters belongs to his former mistress Shirley Abbott (Janice Rule). He arrives exhausted, limping, and dejected from the day’s adventuring. He depressingly states that “nothing’s turned out the way [he] thought they would.” Further truths about his actual life are revealed in which their affair was broken off by Ned in an attempt to preserve the illusion of a happy domestic life with his family. Though Shirley has former feelings for him and thought they would have “ma[d]e it”, she is a match for Ned’s persistent fantasizing by harshly telling him that “[she] put that smile on [his] face, [the] damned hypocrite.” She further chisels at his fantasy’s cracks by informing him that she is just as sexually promiscuous as he, having flings with a “groovy bellhop” that were “absolutely primitive, no hang-ups.” Ned cannot believe it and attempts one final seduction, only to be rebuffed once more and thrown out of another pool that he once took advantage of in the past.

When Ned comes upon the public pool at the recreation center, all the final truths of reality come for him. Despite living in the “house on the hill,” Ned cannot even afford to pay the entrance fee and has to borrow money from local business owners whom he already owes money to for his former lavish lifestyle. To the swimmers of the public pool, Ned’s family is a “great big joke” – a disrespected wife that he is separated from and daughters whose drunken car accidents he has had to pay for to keep them out of legal trouble. Penniless, injured, and alone, Ned summons one last moment of Herculean strength by running away from reality once more and climbing up a rock hill to his final destination, home.

Ironically, our titular character, or “explorer” as Ned describes himself to others, does not own a private pool himself. Instead, his residence, his “golden playpen”, features a tennis court, where his wife Lucinda is waiting and his girls are playing. At least, they are in the ultimate fantasy that Ned has been dreaming about all day long. In this surrealist drama, Ned travels in the endless afternoon sun. By the time he arrives home, day has now become night and the pleasant weather from before has turned into stormy weather. Although Ned did finish his quest, did swim the Lucinda River, reality downpours onto Ned as he whimpers and bangs outside an empty home he no longer owns and is locked out from. As Eddie Cochran once sang: “‘Cause there ain’t no cure for the summertime blues.”

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Summertime Blues: The Swimmer