Swimming Pool Review
By Joe Lozito
"Pool" Smarty
In "Swimming Pool", aging British mystery writer Sarah Morton (Charlotte Rampling) takes a vacation at an idyllic French country home with the titular amenity. The time alone is exactly what Sarah needs to get her creative juices flowing until her editor's promiscuous teenage daughter (Ludivine Sagnier) upsets the waters.
Director Francois Ozon knows how to set a mood and he's happy to takes his time letting Sarah explore her new surroundings. But with Ms. Rampling and Ms. Sagnier as his cast, he is able to sit back and let the sparks fly. The actresses bite into their roles with palpable gusto as the sparring of two generations escalates from girlish pranks to more serious business. This is not a soap opera and it is certainly not MTV's the "Real World". The two characters behave as they do not for shock value, but because of who they are and who we have come to know them as. Each woman thinks she is in the right.
As much as Ms. Sagnier may get noticed for her ferociously racy performance, the movie is Ms. Rampling's from the start and she takes it and runs with it. She creates such a vivid realization of Sarah's repression that a drunken scene in which she starts dancing is so uncomfortable, it's nearly difficult to watch.
The cast is let down by a script, co-written by Mr. Ozon, which feels the need to twist when it should have gone straight. Like "Adaptation", "Swimming Pool" is able to get away with certain key moments in the name of the writer's imagination, but unfortunately much of the final act feels like it goes off the deep end.
