Swimfan

Rating:
Summary: Whatever
Review: If hating this movie proves I got bad taste then I am glad to have bad taste. This movie was terrible. I watched it with my dog and he got bored. Then I watched it with my friends to give the movie a second chance and now they won't speak to me again for ruining their lives by subjecting them to such garbage. By the way my dog could have out acted the cast easily. And the cat next door could have written a better script. Look save your money on this crap and rent something more meaningful like Blues Clues or Big Bird's Big Adventure. The acting in those films were ten times better than any of the stiffs in Swimfan. This was about as scary as Sesame Street and as entertaining as watching bread mold. Believe me you'd rather watch bread mold than Erika what's her face struggling over her lines. This film sucks toe jam. If you enjoyed this then Betty Ford was invented just for you because you'd have to be high, drunk or one of the cast members to be able to claim this was good with a straight face. Please let there be life after Swimfan.

Rating:
Summary: someone should recall this Swimming With Crap
Review: A Fatal Attraction for the high school generation. This was about a pyscho girl played by Erika Christensen (Homeroom, The Perfect Score) who lives with her mom and her brother is a weird nerdy kid. She stalks Jesse Bradford's (Bring It On, Clockstoppers) character who is on the "swim team". After water polo fun (sex) in the swimming pool Bradford's life becomes a living eternal hell when Christensen sends him pictures, makes his life a living hell and almost kills his girlfriend. The real truth is, is she picks athletes and stalks them till they cant be stalked no more. If you call this movie a 5 star movie, there's something seriously wrong with you, truly. It felt like I took poison pills 20 times when watching it only once. Christensen isn't that great in this movie...she's kinda annoying. Also starring James DeBello (Cabin Fever, Detriot Rock City) as Christensen's silent nerdy brother.

Rating:
Summary: Swim fan movie..
Review: Basically, "Swimfan" is the high school version of "Fatal Attraction." I had mixed feelings about this movie. The storyline was very compelling, but yet it was very choppy and the writing was average at best. Unfortunately, this is probably a movie that some high school kids can relate to.

The storyline is quite simple. Ben Conrin (Jesse Bradford, "Bring It On") is a high school senior who has basically a perfect life. He is the captain of the swimming team and has a full-ride scholarship to Stanford University in the works. He's a straight-A student. And best of all, he has a wonderful, pretty, and trustworthy girlfriend named Amy (Shiri Appleby, "Roswell"). However, all of that is about to change when "the new girl" arrives as a transfer student. The new girl, Madison Belle (Erika Christensen) is a blue-eyed, blonde-hair beauty, but little do we know, she has a turbulent background. After they have an encounter in school (she needed help getting her locker open), she develops a crush on him and convinces him that they should hang out for one night, just as friends. But however, that turns into a "one night stand," as they end up having sex in the high school swimming pool. Madison even gets Ben to tell her that he loves her during their lovemaking. Now Ben's life really starts to go down the drain (no pun intended). Madison becomes completely obsessed with him, and begins to stalk him, call him all the time, and sends him explicit pictures of herself via e-mail. Ben finally tells her off, and then things really get bad. He gets kicked off the swim team for alledgedly using steroids, his relationships in school and his grades begin to suffer, and he is accused of nearly killing Amy in a hit-and-run accident. Convinced that Madison is behind all of this, Ben must find out about her past to save his own future.

The movie itself is relatively short, only 85 minutes long, so the story is very fast-paced. I thought Erika Christensen was excellent as "The Girlfriend From Hell," but other than that, the acting is average. I thought this was a decent movie, but it could have been so much better. 3 stars.

Rating:
Summary: Solid MST3Ker
Review: In Swimfan we have another unintended schlockfest. Utterly predictable plot, pedestrian acting, chiche' dialogue and the obligatory invincible villain all conspire together to make an eminently enjoyable hour and a half of laughs and gags.

Forget any empathy with the protagonist. First off, he is a cad who cheats on his smart and beautiful girlfriend with someone he just met named Madison. Sure, Madison is sexy too, but in the age of Aids, herpes and various other incurable sexually transmitted diseases his promiscuity is just plain dumb. I mean, if some girl you just met is willing to sleep with you then you can bank on her also sleeping with just about anyone else who wanders into the hallway.

Next, this movie continues the new movie tradition of invincible villains. Madison somehow is able to be everywhere and predict just about anything. This plot device may have been entertaining 20 years ago, but now it just gets to be old and it is no longer even the least bit suspenseful.

The only way this movie can work is if everyone within the movie's universe is an idiot. And so it is. The cops don't cuff the arrestee's hands behind her back like real cops do. The protagonist, when faced with a disqualifying urinalysis, is too rock stupid to immediately demand another one.. as is his right. These plot contrivances go on and on resulting in a town populated with people who act in the most irrational fashion possible.

The laughs don't stop with the movie. Play the commentary track and you will hear the actors talking about this crudfest as if it is a work of high art! They actually believe they have done something creative and unique! What beautiful self-deception!

Hold it! I just realized that this movie does depict real people in real life. After seeing so many members of the acting profession open their mouths and spew their idiotic opinions for the last few years I realize now that Swimfan's plot would work in the real world if the real world were populated entirely by actors.

Get the popcorn and your friends all together. Plop Swimfan into the DVD player and have a primo MST3K hoot.

Rating:
Summary: Nto Bad, But Not Good Either
Review: Had a couple of the scary moments, and the "I wonder what's goin to happen next" moments, but it wasn't that bad.

Rating:
Summary: A potential cult classic?
Review: Remember a little film some time ago called "Fatal Attraction"? C'mon, fess up. Sure, you despise Michael Douglas and Glenn Close as actors, but even you heard about this film. It's a movie that turned male/female relationships on its head by having Close's character stalk Michael Douglas after an adulterous affair turns sour. If you didn't go and see it in the theaters, you must have seen it one night on cable when you couldn't sleep. Well, I and about a million other reviewers decided to drop by to tell you that "Swimfan" cribs shamelessly from the concepts reified in "Fatal Attraction." Comments to the effect that this movie is essentially an adolescent version of the Douglas/Close oeuvre aren't inaccurate at all. Where opinion seems to diverge, in quite nasty ways from the looks of things, centers on the success of "Swimfan" in replicating the success its ideological predecessor. Rarely have I seen such discord as I have regarding this film; the divisions that wracked the provinces of the former Yugoslavia aren't as long lasting or contentious as the opinions about this film. I'll just go over the top of the trench right from the start by saying I thought "Swimfan" a fun film worth wasting time on. In fact, I would watch it again.

Meet, if you dare, Ben (Jesse Bradford), a guy that seems to have everything going for him. His girlfriend Amy (Shiri Appleby) absolutely adores him, he's the star on the swim team with scouts coming to watch his moves at the next big meet, and the school generally worships him. Sure, he's got it tough in a few things. He lives with his single mom who occasionally gives him heck over minor issues because he has a checkered past. Too, Amy stresses over the possibility that she won't be going to the same university as Ben after graduation. Throw in a simmering rivalry with testosterone fueled fellow swimmer Josh (Clayne Crawford), and we learn that Ben's perfect life does have a few speed bumps. But none of these issues prepares Ben to deal with the latest threat about to enter his world: Madison Belle (Erika Christensen). Madison is a gorgeous blonde transfer student who rolls into this high school like a teenaged Cleopatra. She immediately sets her sights on Ben as her next personal conquest, and woe to anyone who stands in the way. Of course, we don't know this right away since Belle is all sugar and spice. But over time, she slowly ingratiates herself into Ben's tightly controlled universe. Benny, of course, sets himself up for the fall by wooing Madison in the swimming pool. Oops.

Whoever melds with Madison stays with Madison, apparently. She conned Ben into saying "I love you," and that's enough for things to head south. Belle starts instant messaging her new beau incessantly, calls him at all times of the day and night, and accosts him in the hallways. Then things become obsessive. Madison sends him suggestive pictures in e-mail, shows up at his house to meet his mother without Ben knowing about it beforehand, and starts dating the turbulent Josh in an effort to arouse jealousy. When these gimmicks don't bring the hardheaded Ben around, Madison pulls out all the stops. Outright violence committed against those Benny loves, coupled with sinister shenanigans involving a drug test for the swim meet, finally convince our dense hero that he must take action soon. Forming an alliance with her weird cousin Dante (James Debello), Benjamin digs into Madison Belle's past and finds a nightmare of twisted insanity. This girl is profoundly dangerous, and it's up to our protagonist to cobble together a plan that will save his relationship with Amy, protect those he loves, and clear himself of the various legal problems brought about by Madison's machinations. With all of this to go on, the twisty conclusion should hardly come as a surprise.

I thought the performances weren't too bad in "Swimfan." Christensen is certainly easy on the eyes and plays evil well, so no problem there. Shiri Appleby does an acceptable job playing the slightly clueless Amy, and she has great chemistry with Bradford. Less interesting are Bradford, Crawford, and Debello. The last two don't have much to do beyond going over the top, and Bradford alternates between successful young man and blockheaded dupe too many times to be believable. Veteran character actor Dan Hedaya is largely wasted in the role of Coach Simkins, Ben's swim team coach. I think I liked the movie so much for the same reason so many despised it, i.e. so many ridiculous and illogical scenarios unfold on a regular basis. Example number one: why does Amy recover from her accident at Ben's house? Doesn't she have parents that care about her? Example number two: since when do swimmers bask in the high school social spotlight? I thought football players always took precedence, with basketball players possibly in second place. But swimmers? How strange is that? Example number three: since when do drug test results come back seconds before the swim meet starts? It's fun to pick this movie apart.

I could probably go on and on with plot holes and other errors, but I don't want to. Even when you're laughing uncontrollably at the onscreen antics, "Swimfan" entertains. Although the movie tanked at the box office, you wouldn't know it by looking at the extras on the disc. You get a lively commentary with Bradford and Christensen, a trailer for "28 Days Later," a making of featurette, and plenty of extended and deleted scenes. Many of these omitted scenes, if left in the film, might have helped "Swimfan" succeed at the theater because they often fill in a few plot holes. I wouldn't be surprised at all if this movie turned into a cult classic someday.



Rating:
Summary: Someone left the cake out in the rain......
Review: Ingredients:

One promising young actor - male
One promising young actress - female
One swimming pool - multipurpose
One generic cast of students
One generic cast of adults
One copy of "Fatal Attraction"
One copy of "American Pie"

Directions:

Mix all the above together in a leaking blender with the slightest pinch of spice and drama.

Pour into an ungreased plot-less vessel

Let sit for 85 minutes

Scrape it out in uneven chunks and distribute to people you don't like very much.

Throw out recipe

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This movie tries too hard, and ends up missing the boat. It's a swimming movie without much swimming; a thriller without the chills; a cheating movie without a difference; a rebel without a clue - with huge gaps in logic that permeate the wafer thin plot like Swiss cheese.

Not very original? Well, neither is the movie.

A waste of a good recipe idea

Amanda Richards October 3, 2004

Rating:
Summary: I'm a fan of "Swimfan"
Review: "Swimfan" is a movie that takes you out of your comfort zone. There are moments that make your heart beat faster and moments that make you squirm. Dark, sexy, and eerily realistic, "Swimfan" will make you rethink all of the relationships you ever had-or didn't have. If you're ready to plunge into the dangerous, yet overlooked world of obsessive love, then this is the movie you've been waiting for. Kiss those other raunchy teen flicks goodbye!

Contentment drips off of Ben Cronin, a high school swimmer with a sweet girlfriend and a shot at Stanford. But his happiness is soon tested by Madison Bell, a beautiful new student who is quick to lead Ben astray. After a one-night stand in the school pool, Madison assumes the two are an item, and starts moving in for the kill. Ben, however, realizes his mistake, and attempts to distance himself from her. What he doesn't know is that the farther he tries to get from Madison, the closer she comes. She befriends his real girlfriend, makes out with his teammate, steals his car, and eventually, screws him over in a way that may be fatal.

Love it or loathe it, "Swimfan" has an intriguing storyline that, unfortunately, some of us may be able to relate to. It shatters the belief that stalking is glamorous and idyllic. In addition, it demonstrates that both women and men may be victimized by this crime.

"Swimfan" may not be the kind of movie you would like to watch every weekend, but it does merit some consideration. The main actors-Jesse Bradford, Erika Christensen, and Shiri Appleby-may not be the most notable Hollywood figures, either, but they (especially Christensen, who plays Madison) give solid performances. This is a movie that all teenagers should see, just to raise their awareness about the important issue of stalking.

**Pay attention to the lighting-a lot of thematic symbolism there.


Rating:
Summary: Love to talk thru it...
Review: Hate people that talk thru movies but some are just like that. They take themselves so seriously and all you can do is sit back and talk to the characters as they act stupidly or believe the improbable... Audience participation movies (ie. 'Fear' with Reese Witherspoon and Mark Walhberg & 'Abandoned' with Katie Holmes & 'Unfaithful' with Diane Lane)
So, Ben is excellent swimmer with scholarships on the horizon (he was actually one of Joan Cusak's sons in My Blue Heaven who's now grown up - Jesse Bradford) - his girlfriend, Amy is the sweetest girl-next-door type (Roswell girl-next-door - Shiri Appleby).Enter the NEW GIRL. Madison is blond and naturally a slut but hey - also crazy.
Now of course our lead goes for her (as she sets up a situation where he can have her but without letting the girlfriend be any the wiser... our hero is stupid). There is a line the 1st time they're having sex something like her asking him to say he loves her even if he doesn't mean it... and he does. So stupid.
So she cyber stalks him, systematically ruins his life... I won't ruin the end but - Predictable.
The blond crazy girl - Erika Christensen - was also in the Banger Sisters and Perfect Score. She was good in this movie but she's sort of expressionless. Somewhat distracting in her other movies - works in this one.
One Star for the actual movie - Three more just because I love to laugh -