The Big Bad Swim

This indie film looks at the lives of a group of people taking an adult swim class in Connecticut. The plot is fairly thin. What drives the film is the characters, excellently played by mostly unknown actors. Standouts in the cast are Brewster as a high school teacher experiencing marital problems and Weixler as a casino dealer who moonlights as a stripper. The two actresses give natural performances and work well together. This is an impressive feature film debut for writer Schechter and director Setton. The latter keeps the narrative moving at a fast clip. The film title and poster suggest something raunchy, but this is a marvelous little comedy-drama.

A community pool in Connecticut is the setting for this "under the radar" film which is charming, funny, entertaining, and appealing. Although it won prizes in major film festivals, "The Big Bad Swim" was not released to hordes of theaters across America, but was distributed in DVD form, and shown in theaters selectively.

It is unfortunate that "The Big Bad Swim" never had the marketing hype of a Hollywood release, considering how many sinkers Hollywood HAS released this year, such as "I Know Who Killed Me." "The Big Bad Swim," a genuinely good independent film, has had to swim upstream on its own.

Nevertheless, in "The Big Bad Swim," actress Paget Brewster is endearing and believable as Amy, the wired-to-breaking point math teacher who not only is being dumped by her husband but also is about to lose her job, and ends up taking a gamble on a new life. TV soap actor Jeff Branson-- who is HOT-- plays Noah, the earnest, vulnerable swim teacher who goes the extra pool length to help his students overcome their fears, and discovers he can learn from his students. Pretty, sexy Jess Weixler (did I just see her in a bank commercial?) deftly plays Jordan, the swimmer-to-be who works two jobs, one as a pole dancer, the other as a blackjack dealer. Her character provides the catalyst for change amongst the ensemble, but is the least understandable of the characters, because of a lack of a "back story" or motivation as to why she does what she does. Jordan is young enough to still live at home with a ubiquitous, video-camera-toting younger brother who spies on her. However, her parents are not shown to be involved with her life in any way, which seems odd. There's no drunken mother or abusive father here to explain why a normal, attractive girl from a Connecticut suburb would choose to be a self-medicating pole dancer who debases herself for loutish bachelor parties.

Despite this quibble, "The Big Bad Swim" succeeds, in large part, because it is a happy, feel good film.

As one might expect, learning to swim is the metaphor for life. Ultimately it's better to jump in with both feet, and get in the swim, rather than sit on the deck, because life happens to you anyway.

The Big Bad Swim is a great date movie, a great dorm movie, a great "what haven't I seen" movie, and men like it as well as women.

This film is one of the best independent films that I have seen in a long time. This movie is a real gem. The ensemble cast helps the story flow to the point where nothing seems fake. Not once do you question why all these people are taking a late night swim class. The way the film was shot with underwater views as well as the different camera angles used really brings the viewer into the movie. It is unfortunate that movies like this do not get a major distribution because the cast and crew did a wonderful job. I also had the chance to see the film at The New London Film Festival in Connecticut where much of the movie was shot. I am not the best movie reviewer but please go see this film because you will not be disappointed. Two thumbs up.

I don't know why I picked this movie to watch, it has a strange title and from the description it just looked like something different. Every once in a while its good to try a film that's slightly different from the mainstream Hollywood hero/thriller flick and this film certainly was different. Right from the beginning this film had me intrigued but I couldn't figure out why until the end if the film when I realized that the movie was great because the characters were so real. I thought the acting was superb and the character development really makes you care about them and hope things turn out well for them in the end. I think that everyone who watches the film could in some way relate to one of the characters and this makes for great viewing and some good laughs at the sheer ordinariness of the actors.

At the culmination of the movie you definitely get a sense of well being, and are left with the 'things are going to be OK' type of a feeling. I'm sure this will have wide appeal and should be given a chance.

A sweet indie movie from the aughts. Kind of makes me nostalgic, in a they don't make them like they used to kind of way.

Not perfect (ended up fast forwarding through a lot of the 'individual' storylines) but a refreshing change to this day and age's heavy-messaging media. You forget that they used to make movies about regular people, leading regular lives, with regular problems.

I think what I appreciate most about it is how sincere the movie feels. Life is simply hard. I appreciate these 90's and 2000's movies that are 'hard' enough to simply be OK with that and treat their audience like grown adults, They try no to shirk from showing life as it is: not awful but no fairy tale either.