SWIMMING POOL
by Mark Sells

Swimming Pool is a sexy, stylish mystery that thrives on ambiguity. When a well-known British author takes a respite in the French countryside and is paid a surprise visit from her publisher’s promiscuous daughter, worlds collide. Quiet versus loud, modest versus brash, and cautious versus libertine. And if that’s not enough, throw in a murder to make things even more complicated. Setting veteran actress Charlotte Rampling against the up-and-coming Ludivine Sagnier pays off remarkably well, as director François Ozon creates a thought-provoking mystery that will leave you re-analyzing every detail.

Celebrity crime fiction author Sarah Morton (Rampling) has not taken kindly to fame. Her best selling books, involving a detective similar to Ruth Rendell’s Inspector Wexworth, have entranced an audience of thousands. But Sarah rejects the notion of celebrity, and resists writing another installment in the series. She would prefer to write something different, something more personal. Noticing that she has become a little disgruntled and bored with her routine life, her publisher (Charles Dance) insists she take some time off, offering her the opportunity to spend a few weeks at his plush French retreat.

Sarah welcomes the much needed break, and takes the train to southern France. When she arrives, she is instantly greeted by the chateau’s groundskeeper Marcel (Marc Fayolle), who kindly takes her to the remote hideaway. At the retreat, Sarah sets up her computer, goes to the grocery, and quietly begins to unwind. But just as she gets settled, her quiet is disrupted by the arrival of Julie (Sagnier), her publisher’s daughter. Julie is a sensual and carefree girl who lives by her own rules. She lounges at the pool, smokes and drinks day and night, and takes a different man to bed each night. Her arrival inspires instant irritation in Sarah, who just wants peace and tranquility. As time goes by and tensions taper off, the two actually begin to understand one another; however, when one of Julie’s conquests is murdered, their newly formed relationship is tested further.

Swimming Pool's suspenseful narrative unwinds like a game of cat and mouse. It contrasts the acting styles of Rampling and Sagnier by exploring the idea of which character can annoy the other more. Rampling plays a tightly bound prude, while Sagnier is a boisterous, insouciant vixen. And it’s an exquisitely subdued performance that Rampling delivers, her character so conservative and sterile that the mere thought of a sound or disruption is like nails on a chalkboard. Meanwhile, Sagnier coasts and boasts; yet she is seemingly comfortable working with the more experienced English actress. Together, they break all the boundaries in their relationship, while creating an intriguing chemistry of opposites.

François Ozon is a notorious provocateur, with such early works as Sitcom and Criminal Lovers challenging politically correct conceptions of violence and sexual dysfunction. But Swimming Pool is provocative in a different way. Rather than pushing the limits of vulgarity and obscenity, a la Todd Solondz or Gaspar Noé, Ozon has evolved into an auteur, carefully building tension and deviance into a purposeful piece. Here, chance meetings and sexual encounters create a mood where anything can happen, even murder.

One of the key points in understanding this movie is to carefully watch the transformation of Sarah and Julie’s bodies. Ozon helps us in this matter by seducing the women with the camera, starting with the tips of their toes and gradually moving up every curve and bump in their bodies. He wants you to be seduced and entranced. But he also wants you to notice how their bodies change. At the beginning of the film, Sarah is very uptight, controlling, and naïve. But gradually, she begins to loosen up, drink and smoke more frequently, dance, swim, and even entices Marcel with sexual confidence. Julie, on the other hand, enters the story as the carefree persona, walking around scantily dressed, and behaving in an uninhibited fashion. But towards the end of the film, her character has a role reversal as well, reverting into a childlike innocence -- tearful, scared, and shy. And you’ll also begin to notice that she is not as flawless as she would appear.

The film exists on multiple levels -- the things that actually happen, the things that the author writes about in her book, and the things that never happened. In this respect it is similar to Ozon's 2000 film Under the Sand (also starring Rampling) in which the main character's emotional instability determines the narrative style, with the ending revealing a different aspect altogether. Both pictures salute the David Lynch school of film, with their penchant for blending reality with dreams.

Swimming Pool is great summer fare - the script is a real page-turner, the acting is commendable, and the direction is carefully thought out. Yet despite all of these good qualities, many seem puzzled about the film's abstruse ending. “What just happened?” “Did I miss something?” “What was that all about?” There’s only one solution -- an uncomplicated and obvious explanation requiring a few minutes of afterthought. Many things happen during Sarah’s stay at the French villa. Things that were taken down or uncovered are put back up and covered. People mysteriously come and go. And some things are not always what they appear to be. That’s why you should never judge a book, or in this case a film, by its cover.

©2003 Mark Sells
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