REVIEW: ‘Swimfan’ sank like a rock — Grade C
Swimfan is like a young boy being taught to swim by his father. He gets thrown into the water and told to sink or swim. This self-proclaimed, teen-age “Fatal Attraction” sank like a rock.
It centered on Ben Cronin (Jesse Bradford), a reformed juvie who was the star swimmer on the school team. He had a good job, a loving girlfriend (Shirir Appleby) and an overall happy life. All that changed when he met Madison Bell (Erika Christensen) a new girl at school obsessed with him. After he spurns her, Bell turns into “psycho chick” doing everything in her power to ruin his life.
Christensen’s portrayal of Bell was really the only thing that saved this movie. The part was a step down from her critically-acclaimed performance in “Traffic,” but she brought the same intensity to the part she had there.
Right from the beginning of the movie, there was never a question she was psycho. She ran the gamut from happy psycho to scary psycho to angry psycho to sexy psycho. In this respect, the movie did mirror “Fatal Attraction,” but the similarities stop there. (Thankfully, there was no rabbit scene.)
Personally, I don’t feel the writers gave Christensen enough motivation to be completely psycho. But even with that lacking, she knocked out a performance worthy of being compared to Glenn Close’s Alex.
The plot was very obvious from the beginning. Tense moments were understated, the editing was erratic and reminiscent of an MTV video, the performances (minus Christensen) mostly wooden and the story overall lacking any imagination or originality.
The film makers used all the standard “Scary Movie” tricks like perspective focusing (Cronin peeking around the corner at Bell), clue panning (showing us two trophies in one pan and then only one in the next) and mood lighting (the blue lights over the swimming pool in the high school). But like most of the suspenseful movies these days, (minus “Signs” and “The Others”) this one is nothing new.
Perhaps the most interesting part of the film was the social stigma about Cronin’s past. He spent time in juvenile hall for theft and drug use, cleaned up his act and put it all behind him. Yet once Bell’s revenge starts fingering him as a suspect, everyone assumes it is the truth.
Even his mother admonishes him that this is exactly the way things happened the last time. This concept was true to life. Those branded by society as “bad boys” are often the first to receive the blame whether it is warranted or not.
Unless you like teeny-bopper versions of classic movies, you probably won’t be a fan of “Swimfan.”
Jared Sterzer is a senior majoring in business information systems. Comments can be sent to jwsterz@cc.usu.edu.