| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Dec 6, 2005

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Aug 5, 2005

The anti-touristy mood of Siegel's film sets it apart from other less thoughtful teen beach flicks.

| Original Score: B- | Nov 2, 2003

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Mar 10, 2003

[Siegal] proves that you don't have to be a just out of film school Gen-X'er to make a resonant and entertaining movie about young adults.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Dec 8, 2002

Flawed, but worth seeing for Ambrose's performance.

| Oct 21, 2002

Unlike most teen flicks, Swimming takes its time to tell its story, casts mostly little-known performers in key roles, and introduces some intriguing ambiguity.

| Oct 12, 2002

Though the material sounds complex and potentially sleep-inducing, director Robert J. Siegel paints his portrait of boredom and discontent with deft strokes.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Sep 25, 2002

A gracefully acted, unsentimental, quite likable little coming-of-age movie.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Sep 20, 2002

| Original Score: B+ | Sep 19, 2002

The film is an earnest try at beachcombing verismo, but it would be even more indistinct than it is were it not for the striking, quietly vulnerable personality of Ms. Ambrose.

| Sep 18, 2002

The town has kind of an authentic feel, but each one of these people stand out and everybody else is in the background and it just seems manufactured to me and artificial.

Full Review | Sep 16, 2002

Swimming isn't a major film. Nor does it try to be. But what, in the end, is a major film? If it's one that accomplishes what it sets out to do, then we ought to correct ourselves.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Sep 13, 2002

A refreshingly authentic coming-of-age tale.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Sep 13, 2002

An unusually dry-eyed, even analytical approach to material that is generally played for maximum moisture.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Sep 13, 2002

Swimming is above all about a young woman's face, and by casting an actress whose face projects that woman's doubts and yearnings, it succeeds.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Sep 13, 2002

A well-crafted film that is all the more remarkable because it achieves its emotional power and moments of revelation with restraint and a delicate ambiguity.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Sep 12, 2002

As relationships shift, director Robert J. Siegel allows the characters to inhabit their world without cleaving to a narrative arc.

| Sep 10, 2002

Offers absolutely nothing I hadn't already seen.

Full Review | Original Score: 1/4 | Aug 23, 2002

Keenly observed and refreshingly natural, Swimming gets the details right, from its promenade of barely clad bodies in Myrtle Beach, S.C., to the adrenaline jolt of a sudden lunch rush at the diner.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Aug 23, 2002