‘Young Woman and the Sea’ Film Review: The Choppy Waters of Clichés

To play Trudy Ederle, the first woman to swim across the English Channel, Daisy Ridley trained under the tutelage of Olympic swimmer Siobhan-Marie O’Connor. Ridley’s dedication to getting her character’s swimming technique down correctly is evident every moment she is in the water; the actress looking as if she could compete against any of the world’s best swimmers. Such a committed performance is a pleasure to watch. It is too bad that Joachim Rønning’s Young Woman and the Sea only stays afloat when the actress is in the water. Rønning’s is the type of film that presents its true subject on simplistic (and sometimes cartoonish) levels. This was the problem with many of Disney’s so-called “serious” films of the early 1980s. The “House of Mouse” produced this picture along with Jerry Bruckheimer and Paramount Pictures. Trudy Ederle’s story is certainly inspiring and we get a few uplifting moments, but the failure of the film as a whole lies in the screenplay’s superficial telling of the tale.

Adapting Glenn Stout’s book, Young Woman and the Sea: How Trudy Ederle Conquered the English Channel and Inspired the World, screenwriter Jeff Nathanson captures Ederle’s “can do” spirit but draws every other character and situation in the most simplistic manner possible.

Set in 1920s New York, Young Woman and the Sea finds Daisy Ridley as Trudy Ederle, a young woman who survived the measles as a child and desires to make her life count. Trudy’s father (a fine Kim Bodnia) runs the family butcher shop while her mother (Jeanette Hain, doing a lot with a little) does the womanly household duties of the time, although she is truly the glue that keeps the family together. Trudy’s younger brother (Ethan Rouse) is written as an afterthought while her sister Margaret (a solid Tilda Cobham-Hervey) is her best friend and source of encouragement.

The two sisters begin swimming in the Coney Island waters to earn free hot dogs from Nathan’s, a prize offered to those who can successfully swim around the pier. From there, Trudy and Margaret’s skills increase, as does their desire to compete in swim meets, something women of the time were not allowed to do. The sisters know they are as good, if not better, than most of the male swimmers and are determined to prove themselves.

Their mother finagles a deal with swim coach Charlotte Epstein (Sian Clifford). The pool is in the boiler room, as women aren’t allowed in pools where men swim. Coach Epstein agrees to let the sisters practice when the team has finished their exercises, as long as Trudy feeds the boiler. The coach feels she is too small and skinny to have what it takes. Eventually proving herself to Epstein, Trudy shows more strength and stamina than the rest of the girls. While Clifford’s character is fairly wasted, the actress gives a good performance and does her best to craft something memorable from her underwritten role.

Once Trudy begins to shine, Margaret’s swimming dreams fail to materialize, as she throws herself back into the dutiful suppression that swallowed up so many women of the era. Unfortunately, the film skimps on any real examination of Margaret’s tribulations.

Trudy proves herself  a supremely skilled swimmer, which earns her a spot on the US team for the 1924 Summer Olympics. Saddled with a sexist coach (a hammy Christopher Eccleston) who won’t let his team of “girls” train properly, Ederle fails to win the gold, her dreams shattered until setting her sights on the English Channel.

Nathanson’s script is sometimes offensively facile, as the strong story of Ederle’s life and accomplishments are reduced to a dramatic minimalism. While the final act works (how can it not?), the rest of the picture is a sea of cloying clichés. Amongst the myriad of hardships regarding Trudy’s uphill battle to swim the channel, no serious drama is constructed, making a good deal of the film no deeper than a middle school book report.

That the film turns Stephen Graham’s Bill Burgess (the legendary swimmer who becomes one of Trudy’s biggest supporters) into a buffoon, is one its biggest crimes. Graham is a great actor. The way his character is written is an insult.

What does work is Oscar Faura’s excellent cinematography. His camera captures the beauty and dangers of the sea while bathing the film in a picture-postcard vision of the 1920s. There are many striking shots that give the film a visual power when it needs it most. Complementing Faura’s work, Amelia Warner’s terrific score finds the right balance of rousing and tender and exists somewhere between James Horner and Enya, as occasional synth and choral tones are woven into her grand orchestral compositions.

Joachim Rønning fails to make something gripping out of Ederle’s struggles. Her on-land issues with her father and the sexist societal expectations of the era are fairly sanitized, while her struggles in the water (jellyfish, getting lost in the darkness, etc) are undercut by the director’s simplistic execution. The filmmakers barely go beyond surface level regarding Trudy’s desire to succeed at the death-defying swim. For the entirety of the piece, no real insight is given to its subject. Daisy Ridley does great work, but the film shortchanges her, weighting her portrayal down with too many limitations.

Ultimately, I hope this movie attracts mothers who will take their young daughters to the theater. Trudy Ederle’s story is too uplifting to ignore, and watching her swim the channel (in the film’s final half hour) certainly could make one’s heart soar.

However, a film cannot get by on message alone, and that is what ultimately torpedoes Young Woman and the Sea. It is not the dangerous waters of the English Channel, but the insurmountable blandness found in the script that fail to keep it afloat.

PG, 129 Minutes, Walt Disney Pictures, Jerry Bruckheimer Films, Paramount Pictures