Swimming With Men is a British comedy film directed by Oliver Parker. The plot sees Eric, a man unhappy with his life looking for an escape from it all; that escape synchronised swimming. He joins a club and they compete for an international title, learning what is important along the way.
This film is an unfunny comedy film, that is all I need to say. It failed to make me laugh once across the whole runtime, there were moments that made me smile, but it wasn’t funny.
As far as ‘heartfelt comedies’ go (that is what I am calling things like Finding Your Feet and Fisherman’s Friends), this film is not deep. The others try and tell you something about life, usually a lesson, to varying degrees of success; this one has no such message. Basically the message of the film is don’t be a dick to your wife, because then she’ll chuck you out and you will be sad.
Rob Brydon’s character is a dick throughout most of the film and he is very hard to root for or empathise with, even by the end of the film when he has supposedly changed his mindset because of his emotional journey, brought about by swimming, he is still only marginally better. What I believe dooms this film is the writing; it is poorly written. It tries and fails to pull on our heart strings and really just wastes your time.
Overall, this is on the bad side of meh, if you have a soft spot for these sorts of comedies you might like it, but don’t hold your breath.
Pros.
Its watchable
It isn’t too long
Cons.
The lead is hateable
The emotional journey doesn’t work
It fails to make you feel something.
It is aggressively average.
1/5
Reviewed by Luke
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