Swimming Pool

[orion59]

Posted: 5/10/04 at 8:31am

Has anyone seen this movie and, if so, did you get it? Can you explain what happened?

SPOILERS for thsoe who plan to see it

I watched it this weekend and was enjoying it very much...then came the ending. maybe I'm stupid but, I couldn't quite figure out what had happened. It was obvious that everything that happened in the French villa was imagined by the novelist. However, I cant figure out if it was her novel tahtw as being acted out in her mind. If so, there are certain things that don't fit like her publisher saying that her latest book wasn't as good as the crime novels she had written. The story in France involved a murder?

If you ahve any idea what I'm talkeing and have seen this movie, please give me your interpretation of what happened.

[JakeB]

Posted: 5/10/04 at 9:22am

Loved it; so airy yet with dark rumblings beneath.

Can't rememeber the ending though; my only recollection is of the extremely fit woman laying naked by the pool. Lol.

[BwayLover]

Posted: 5/10/04 at 9:44am

Well, I loved this movie mainly because of Charlotte Rampling's performance- I think she's brilliant.

My interpetation is this: Yeah, she did imagine everything, but the book that she gave him was not about what happened in the villa but the book that Julie's mother had supposedly written... What do you think? The other thing is, I didn't really look for a reason why the publisher didn't like it- no one needs a reason not to like anything.

[orion59]

Posted: 5/10/04 at 9:52am

I wasn't too concerned with why he didn't like the book. i think it was established pretty early on that his concern was that she continue doing what made money, the crime novels. I had wondred if the events we saw in France were actaully the novel she was writing, why the finished product was not a crime novel. The other thing to consider is, if the book she wrote was the reworking of his former wife's novel, where did CharlotteRampling's character get it? It was obvious that the young woman in the French villa was not the publishers daughter and therefore may not have existed at all.

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 5/10/04 at 10:57am

Here's what I understood:

She definitely went to the villa and wrote the book, but everything with the daughter never happened. She imagined what the daughter would be like based on the conversation she overheard in her publisher's office. The story she wrote was her fictional account of her relationship with the daughter and what would happen if their worlds had collided. It is't until the end back at the publisher's office that she actually sees what the real daughter even looks like.

[orion59]

Posted: 5/10/04 at 11:02am

Now it's starting to become a little clearer. She goes to teh villa and begins writing a crime novel based on her imagined relationship with the publishers daughter. She ends up writing another type of story, one that was started by the girls dead mother, and having that published. However, nobody gave her the unfinished novel beacuse it never existed. It came from her own mind.

She had wanted to write something different but apparently couldn't without having her characters, in a sense, do it for her.

Thanks guys. Hearing everyone elses interpretation, I can fianlly put it all together.

Updated On: 5/10/04 at 11:02 AM

[BwayLover]

Posted: 5/10/04 at 1:09pm

Yeah, that totally makes sense, Mister Matt- I agree with you.

You know, I like these types of movies- the kind you actually think about after you leave the movie theater.

And Orion- I like your signature. Very funny. :)

[Ruffian]

Posted: 5/10/04 at 1:49pm

I thought along the lines of Mister Matt

I enjoyed the film

[orion59]

Posted: 5/10/04 at 7:52pm

I'm going to have to watch it again. Maybe I'll pick up on more of the subtlties this time around.