MovieChat Forums > The Swimmer (1968) Discussion > Is Ned going to Hell? (Spoilers)

Is Ned going to Hell? (Spoilers)

posted 14 years ago by Deluge69-663-991830
6 replies | jump to latest

I saw this very strange film a few years backs. I found it interesting and disturbing, being that I couldn't fully figure it out.

First, Ned appears to be a bascially decent, likeable man, and the first old friends he meets seem genuinely pleased to see him.

Then, as he proceeds from pool to pool, people who once knew him, become more hostile.

Almost like Homer's Odyssey in reverse.

The big question is: Where has Ned been for those two years? Where did he come from when we are introduced to him at the film's beginning?

Was his tragedy far worse than losing his job, his wife and family, and high position and status among the upper middle-class?

Did he crack up and end up in a mental hospital, feeling much guilt over his losses?

Or, Did he murder his wife and two daughters, and ended up in a mental hospital where he dies?

When dying, he "sees" himself going on his pool odyssey, and is slowly going to hell, as he finally arrives "home" at the end.

Similar to CARNIVAL OF SOULS, SIXTH SENSE, JACOB'S LADDER, POINT BLANK, HIGH PLAINS DRIFTER? Gradually, the film seems to take on subtle supernatural qualities.

At first, everything is sunny and pleasant, but starts becoming more cold, isolating and bleak as he goes from one pool to the next. Is he imagining all the people he is meeting along the way?

Also, after he leaves each pool, we never see the characters he meets again. Like they are now gone forever. Is he a lost spirit plunging through Purgatory, eventually arriving to hell?

He seems to choose to block out all the terrible things he did, thus not redeeming himself, thus damning his soul to eternal hell. He'll always remain at the front door to his decayed home, trying desperately to get in. And he'll never be able to go back.

Ned is dying, his life flashing before him, then finally ends up in hell.

Almost like a feature version of TWILIGHT ZONE. And what about the unsettling similarities to OCCURENCE AT OWL CREEK BRIDGE? Like that protagonist, he is also swimming and running through the woods. The young babysitter he meets could also be an illusion, like in OAOCB, when he runs towards his wife, who turns out to be a dream.

Very spooky and darkly disturbing.

I know the film is meant to be ambiguous, but these later disturbing thoughts began popping up.

Also, Does Ned represent the darker sides of our selves?

I feel the film is deliberately set-up so you'll never fully know, but will trip on possibilities.

I wonder if Rod Serling and Richerd Matheson ever saw this. Definitely right up their dark alleys.

Any further opinions?

[–] Big G-2 13 years ago

That was a great observation!

This movie is chalk full of symbolisms that at best, can be interpreted in many different ways. For me, I can see this as somehow we the audience are actually looking at his psychoanalysis (almost like a modern version of THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGIRI). As you said, he does block any bad memories or situations, and it is the neighbors he meets, especially the later ones who did not particular care for Ned, that “throw the cold water at him” (hence he is getting more chilly with each stop).

The one encounter he meets was the little boy, who didn't know Ned (and thus didn't know what happened to him). I almost saw that as Ned meeting himself as a kid. Both lonely, both meeting in virtually out of nowhere. Ned teaching the kid (and perhaps ultimately himself in later years) how to swim. And it was interesting that as Ned was leaving, he comes back to save the kid from the diving board, which of course, the pool had no water. Saving him from going off the deep end? Perhaps that was what Ned wished would have happened to him, but no one was around?

[–] onleft23 13 years ago

your comment is very interesting - 'is ned going to hell?'

this movie terrifies me
and im not kidding
as all appears 'normal' and 'sane'
but as it goes along normalcy and sanity
- bedrocks of stability every society needs to maintain itself -
begin to chip away
what is 'normal'? what is 'sane'?

sorry if my reply reads nutty
but
to answer your question i think a case could be made ned is already in hell
a sort of sisyphusian (sp?) hell and he's made this trip before
- and will again

anyway ... whatever ...

just to close this out the final shot in this movie is the single most
disturbing scene ive ever watched in any movie

and at the risk of sounding over dramatic it was REALLY reassuring for me
to find this imdb thread and read that 'the swimmer' effected others
as it did me

to me this film is the ultimate horror movie

[–] eeoulo 11 years ago

oneleft, you're really hitting at something here about this movie. The terror of having everything you knew, thought, or loved all stripped away to leave you alone and cold. He's left cold and confused wondering what happened to his life, those bedrocks or who he thought he was and what he thought he had. Every aspect of himself was pealed back in one way or another and removed. It truly is a psychological (I'm tempted to use the word thriller, but can't) chiller.

By leaving so much open too it makes it easy to apply back to ourselves and our own lives, our own state we call sanity.

[–] Deluge69-663-991830 13 years ago

This movie has a way of staying with you. I've tried to forget it because it is so disturbing, but it still comes back to haunt me. The sure sign of a great horror story.

What is it really trying to say?

I grew up in a similar middle class environment. UGH!

I painfully learned how phony so many of the people were. It drove me into becoming the loner/misanthrope. And now I'm very happy it did. I escaped from the pod people.

Shallowness, superficiality, greed, status, arrogance, egotism and how predjudiced and bigoted its "nice" citizens really were.

I know that John Cheever hated the American Middle Class, and was obviously grinding axes when writing this.

Interesting, about what you said when Ned meets the young boy, who may have been himself as a lonely kid. This can throw some sympathy his way, growing up around uncaring parents and snotty, two-faced neighbors.

The empty pool symbolizing emptiness.

And perhaps he will go on living this odyseey nightmare for all eternity.

And, the real disturbance is, are we all something like Ned and these contemptible characters?

I believe this is a truly disturbing supernatural horror story that at first masquerades itself as something very "nice."

It makes you seriously question just about everything.

[–] spencerthetracy 11 years ago

Interesting and compelling observation. If he had been heading to Hell certainly the 'judgement' was when he talked to the couple at the swimming pool and they laid into him about what a fool he had been and all his faults. It was something to watch. His world really fell apart after that.

[–] bon22 11 years ago

Upon viewing the final scene, we realize that this is a horror movie: The locked, abandoned, dilapidated house & the decrepit tennis court. We realize he no longer lives there & his wife & daughters are gone. Where are they? We don't know.

Then, we realize that he's in a mental time warp. Everything he said to his neighbors about his wife & daughters was as if he was living 10 years ago. That's when we realize he's had a mental break, he's not living in present time & he's in deep denial.

In the beginning of the film, the neighbors who don't know about his actual current circumstances, treat him as if he's completely normal and sane. As the film progresses, he encounters people who are familiar with his current circumstances and treat him like the delusional person that he truly is. So, one of the final horrors is how can we know if someone we encounter is sane? The other horror is learning that he has tragically lost touch with reality.