A BIGGER SPLASH – Review

Photo by Jack English. © 2016 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation All Rights Reserved

A sunny Italian island, rockstar privilege and a long-standing personal animosity come together in A BIGGER SPLASH.

Tilda Swinton stars a rock-and-roll legend named Marianne, who hiding out on the Italian island of Pantelleria with her younger photographer husband Paul (Matthias Schoenaerts) while her voice heals from recent surgery. The couple’s quiet idyll is interrupted by the sudden arrival of Harry (Ralph Fiennes), Marianne’s former long-time producer and ex-lover, and his newly-discovered daughter Penelope (Dakota Johnson). Harry is a non-stop talker and life of the party, determined to bring back the good old rock-n-roll party days and a tsunami of nostalgia.

Ralph Fiennes is the lightning rod at the center of this taut, sexy psychological thriller. The film is directed by Luca Guadagnino, the Italian director best known for I AM LOVE, the visually lush art-house hit that explored love in the world of the very rich. The mostly-English language A BIGGER SPLASH has some nice photography but not the same intense visual beauty.

The story takes place on Pantelleria, a real-world favorite of celebrities such as Madonna as a hide-out. The island is famous for its rocky, sunny landscape, quaint little villages, pervasive snakes, and as a way station for illegal immigrants from Africa arriving by boat – all of which appear in this film. The film is a loose remake of a 1969 Italian-French thriller named “The Swimming Pool.”

Much of the story does take place around the couple’s pool, and water figures heavily in the story. Due to her surgery, Swinton’s character bares speaks but her presence is strong nonetheless and her character is the center of what unfolds. It is immediately clear the three have a long history together, and in fact, Harry had introduced his friend Paul to Marianne. A certain tension, from long history and how lives diverge over time, fills the air from the start.

Fiennes is electric as Harry, the character who fires up the film. Harry is a lot of fun but he is also exhausting and self-centered. While Marianne and Paul decide that the presence of the young Penelope means no more skinny-dipping in the pool, Harry boldly strips down and dives in bare. A high-energy character never stops talking, a man who is not only the life of the party but determined that everyone must join the party too – whether they want to our not. Fiennes embraces this role with relish, dancing with goofy abandon to old Rolling Stones tunes, strutting about in the nude and exhibiting a child-like enthusiasm as he indulges his nostalgic impulses.

Harry’s energy is entertaining but he is also exhausting and unable to dial it back, and Fiennes captures that sense brilliantly as well. In an early scenes, Harry drags his reluctant hosts, who have been keeping a low profile, to a restaurant, and then name-dropping Marianne’s name to get them a table, much to the irritation of Paul. The scene illustrates much about Harry’s essential character, and how his strong-willed presence disrupts the couple’s quiet, restful break.

Director Guadagnino does a masterful job of creating a dynamic sense of people who have known each other well for years – and have lingering issues between them. Fiennes, Swinton and Schoenaerts are all excellent, and Johnson also does well in the smaller role of the daughter, mostly an observer in the growing tensions. Although the film is primarily in English, the sensibility is entirely European, with tensions slowly building to an explosion at the end. The drama also offers a telling commentary on the privileges of fame.

While not the visual treat of I AM LOVE, this re-pair of star Tilda Swinton and director Luca Guadagnino delivers a taut commentary on relationships and the power of fame, and one striking performance from Ralph Fiennes.

A BIGGER SPLASH opens on May 20th, 2016

OVERALL RATING:  4 OUT OF 5