A remake of Jacques Deray's 'La Piscine' (1969), 'A Bigger Splash' has attracted some big names: Ralph Fiennes, Tilda Swinton, Dakota Johnson and Matthias Schoenaerts make it a star-spangled vehicle indeed.
Recuperating rock star Marianne Lane (Swinton) is on holiday with her lover Paul (Schoenaerts) when their peace and quiet is destroyed by that worst of all afflictions: the uninvited guest. In this case it's Harry Hawkes (Fiennes), Marianne's former producer and lover, who wants to show off his newly-discovered daughter Penelope (Johnson). As the quartet - joined for a time by two more women whom Harry takes it upon himself to invite - cavort under the Italian sun, conversations are held, secrets revealed and betrayals occur.
This is very much an actors' film, and Fiennes does a splendid job as the over-enthusiastic, noisy Harry; I wanted to punch him after about five minutes. Johnson does her best with the standard femme fatale role, and Schoenaerts is perfectly competent. Star of the show, however, is definitely Swinton, who has very few lines (her character is supposed to refrain from speaking after a throat operation) but as she's in most scenes is required to get Marianne's opinions across through facial expression, miming, and sheer force of personality, which she manages splendidly.
This is an engrossing film, with an interesting plot, good acting and lovely scenery (and not just of the countryside variety, either - all four leads get their kit off at some point, although I could have done with fewer such scenes from Mr Fiennes - he's in relatively good nick for a chap in his fifties, but things are starting to sag!) It's strange, though, that an Italian/French co-production is mainly in the English language!
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