‘Nyad’ Evaluate: Annette Bening and Jodie Foster Are Excellent in a Shifting Tribute to Marathon Swimmer

Filmmakers Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin held the primary screening of their Oscar-winning documentary, Free Solo, in Telluride 5 years in the past. So it appears acceptable that their first narrative function, Nyad, additionally has its world premiere at Telluride this yr. Free Solo adopted the dedication of an obsessed mountain climber, and Nyad additionally investigates an obsessive athlete: marathon swimmer and journalist Diana Nyad, who resolved to swim from Cuba to Florida, a 110-mile journey, when she was over 60 years outdated.

The movie has already stirred a measure of controversy, with another athletes and sports activities commentators essential of a number of the exaggerations that Nyad had trumpeted through the course of her lengthy profession. However it’s to the credit score of the filmmakers that although they need to rejoice Nyad’s achievements, they don’t shrink back from dramatizing her selfishness and combative character. And even individuals who could have combined emotions about the actual Diana Nyad will probably be mesmerized by the fierce and fearless efficiency of Annette Bening within the title function.

Bening has all the time been a performer who shunned self-importance, and right here she is prepared to spotlight Nyad’s single-mindedness and vanity. The important thing relationships within the film are Diana’s friendship together with her coach, Bonnie Stoll (Jodie Foster), and with John Bartlett (Rhys Ifans), the ship captain who navigated her failed in addition to her profitable swims. Nyad dangers alienating each of those allies together with her character flaws. It’s a tribute to Bening’s efficiency that she retains us mesmerized by Nyad even at her most stubbornly pigheaded.

In spite of everything, the theme is a common one — the try to defy age and show that there isn’t a expiration date for daunting ambition. The movie, written by Julia Cox, begins at Diana’s sixtieth celebration, in a scene that acknowledges the swimmer’s lesbianism with out making a difficulty of it. From this early second, the friendship between Diana and Bonnie is dramatized with affection however with out sentimentality. Diana’s single-mindedness places a pressure on the bond greater than as soon as, however the two girls’s devotion to one another seems to be very shifting.

Foster has not had many meaty roles lately, and her astringent, deeply felt efficiency makes us understand what we now have been lacking. There isn’t any self-importance in both of those actresses’ work right here. Bening convinces us of Nyad’s drive alongside together with her ruthlessness, which makes Foster’s loyalty to her all of the extra stirring. In a powerful female-driven film, additionally it is value acknowledging the contribution of Ifans, who has had a protracted profession however offers maybe his best efficiency because the smart, hard-nosed ship’s captain who decides to affix Nyad on her ultimate try to cross the ocean, although he’s sick. (Bartlett died in 2013, after Nyad’s profitable swim.)

There are some flaws within the storytelling. Late within the film, Diana speaks about being abused by her swim coach when she was a younger teenager. But when the filmmakers wished to zero in on this subject, they need to have launched it far more lucidly earlier within the movie. It performs nearly as an afterthought right here, an compulsory nod to the sexual abuse that many athletes have confronted. Maybe this component wanted to be included, however it isn’t dealt with as deftly as many of the different materials within the movie.

Alternatively, the cinematography by Claudio Miranda (an Oscar winner for Lifetime of Pi) brings the swimming scenes to vivid life. The ocean scenes have been shot primarily within the Dominican Republic and are all the time alluring and generally suspenseful, with sharks and jellyfish threatening Diana’s journey.

Of their first narrative function, administrators Vasarhelyi and Chin exhibit the identical command of cinematic storytelling that enlivened their documentaries (which embody The Rescue and Wild Life along with Free Solo). Maybe the script might have benefited from a barely darker edge, however as an enveloping sensual expertise and as an appearing showcase, Nyad scores.