Swimming Upstream

I saw a story about that movie on VH1 and couldn't remember what is was called so thanks for posting about it! I remember when I was watching it that actor was talking about how hard it was to learn to swim, he did all the backstroke himself...but the free was a body double. He seemed to have a new appreciation for what swimmer's go through. Hopefully the movie will be as good as it looks. ~Kyra

I was at imdb.com checking out the description and reviews for this film when I decided to search for "swimming" and "swimmer" in the plot summaries. There are a surprising number of entries including several I wish I could get my hands on. For example, this short from Finland: Plot Summary for Krooli (2004) Krooli (The Crawl) is set almost entirely in or by the water. It uses images to explore the significance of water in the philosophy of swimming. It is not a biographical documentary of a swimmer, although the main characters are real competitive swimmers. Even though the film explores the profound meaning of the interface between a swimmer and the water, it is just as much a story of the meaning of a sport to an individual, a young competing athlete. It speaks of devotion and a search for ones own place in sports and life. Just thought some of you might also find the listings interesting.

Originally posted by LindsayNB I read about a dozen reviews of the movie and none of them mentioned anything about any of the characters being gay. Did your comment related to this particular movie in any way or just movies in general? Nah, just movies in general with the exception of Swimfan.

Yeah, I saw a segment on MTV about this movie. The dude's backstroke wasn't that great. They really need to hire stunt swimmers. But hey, at least there is a movie that is about swimming. I am just annoyed tha Hollywood portraying swimmers as being gay. Swimmers almost always seem to be gay for some reason in movies and TV. Thank god, Swimfan portrayed a swimmer as a ladies man. One of the characters from Desperate Housewives will come out and his character is a swimmer.

It's a movie out of Australia about a real person.

The movie is set in the late 50's. I thought that the stroke looked historically correct. Most of the reviews say that it is a real bore, not well filmed, but that some of the acting is good. From what I have read, previews & reviews, I thought it sounded very stereotypical of Austrailian films. That is a drunk father, a suffering mother & young men overcoming the difficulties. Swimmers can be gay or straight. I know a group of 14 yr olds, )they aren't swimmers) they all seem to think that swimming is a gay sport. They are very negative about swimmers. It really surprised me because they live in a part of Illinois that has some pretty good high school swim teams. Monday night, the public t.v. station fromthe quad cities had a series of short movies. One was German. It had no dialogue. It was called "Swimming". It was about a butterflyer & the pool's cleaning woman. The guy doiing the stroke wasn't bad. It was not however, that great if a movie. I think if you can see it, try to.

Originally posted by craiglll@yahoo.com Monday night, the public t.v. station from the quad cities had a series of short movies. One was German. It had no dialogue. It was called "Swimming". It was about a butterflyer & the pool's cleaning woman. Alright, I'll bite. So what happened? You can't just leave it there. Did he finish his set? Did the pool get cleaned? Did he warm down?

I don't really know what happened. At the end of the movie, they were both swimming together. The woman had stolen a swim suit from another woman. It was a weird movie. It is a short German film. What can I say. The guy did swim woth out googles. I thought that wa weird also. I think the German title is Schermerling. It was really an odd movie.

Originally posted by tjrpatt Yeah, I saw a segment on MTV about this movie. The dude's backstroke wasn't that great. They really need to hire stunt swimmers. But hey, at least there is a movie that is about swimming. I am just annoyed tha Hollywood portraying swimmers as being gay. Swimmers almost always seem to be gay for some reason in movies and TV. I read about a dozen reviews of the movie and none of them mentioned anything about any of the characters being gay. Did your comment related to this particular movie in any way or just movies in general? One of the characters from Desperate Housewives will come out and his character is a swimmer. Although I haven't noticed a plethora of characters who are gay and swimmers, I wonder whether it is a case of portraying swimmers as gay or gay men as swimmers? I've never seen this show but I would guess that they decided to have a gay character and then decided he would be a swimmer rather than deciding to have a swimmer and then deciding to make the character gay. I believe that swimming is one of the more popular sports among gay men.

I believe that swimming is one of the more popular sports among gay men. Is that why so many guys in the locker room are always staring at my wedding ring? J/K!! None of the swimmers I know are gay. Actually, most of the guys at the pool I swim at seem to be more interested in watching girls than knocking out sets.