Joyce Glasser reviews NYAD (October 20th- November 3rd) in cinemas then on Netflix; Cert 15, 121 mins.
There is heartbreak, danger, life-threatening illness, money worries and brutal challenges here which fit the mood of the times. But ultimately NYAD is an antidote to all the misery in the news: a triumphant, feelgood story that persuades us never to give up on a dream and that age is no barrier to achievement. And, based on Diana Nyad’s autobiographical book Find a Way, it’s a true story. If that’s not enough, it stars Annette Bening (Film Stars Don’t Die in Liverpool, The Kids Are All Right, The Grifters) and double Oscar winner Jodie Foster (The Silence of the Lambs).
If you are born in New York City (in 1949) it’s not obvious that you’ll become a record breaking swimmer – until you consider what’s in a name. Diana’s parents divorced not long after her birth and her mother remarried a Greek-Egyptian man whose name she adopted and the family moved to Florida. Diana grew up knowing that her surname is a homophone for “naiad”. In Greek mythology, naiads are water nymphs, albeit spirits of fresh water.
We learn in brief recap that Diana broke endurance records. Her first world record was a 10-mile swim in the chilly waters of Lake Ontario (4 hours 22 minutes. She set a women’s record for the 22 mile Gulf of Naples race, followed by, at 26, a world record for swimming 28 miles around Manhattan in just under eight hours. For her 30th birthday, she set a world record for distance swimming for a 102 miles (164 km) swim from North Bimini Island, Bahamas, to Juno Beach, Florida. At 30 she retired from endurance swimming and became a sportscaster and an author (she had published four books).
One goal seemed beyond Diana’s reach, despite her memory of her father pointing across the sea to Cuba, and telling her, ‘it’s so close you can almost touch it.’ Nyad’s attempts to swim from Havana, Cuba to Key West, Florida in 1978, at age 28, ended at 68 miles when strong winds made it impossible to continue.
When we meet Diana Nyad (Bening) she is begging her best friend Bonnie Stoll (Foster) not to buy her cake for a birthday she is dreading. Ignoring her, Bonnie throws a surprise 60th birthday bash. Bonnie’s disciplined, determined and irascible friend enjoys being the centre of attention and realises she has a lot to celebrate.
But Diana has always been conscious of her one precious life, and that failure at age 28 has haunted her ever since. But if she failed at 28 when she was fit and swimming regularly, how could she possibly think of succeeding at 60, and when she hasn’t been in so much as a training pool for three decades?
Diana reminds Bonnie (who was a competitive racquetball player) that sport is half physical and half mental ability. ‘When I was 28 my mind wasn’t clear’, Diana recalls. And in her insistent, goading manner, the now clear-minded swimmer persuades Bonnie to be her coach.
This is the delectable set up for one of the most amazing underdog sports stories ever to grace our screens. It’s not just the fact that, no man or woman ever succeeded in swimming this route and distance. It is not even Diana’s realisation that sponsors are not interested in old women with pipe dreams. It is whether Diana has it in her to persevere after four attempts, two of which come close to killing her.
On July 10, 2010, at the age of 60, Diana begins open water training in preparation, for the estimated 60-hour, 103-mile (166 km) swim from Cuba to Florida. She moves to the Caribbean and then to Florida to train, mile by mile. When the press ask about her motivation, she answers: ‘Because I’d like to prove to the other 60 year-olds that it is never too late to chase your dreams.’
Diana and Bonnie both remortgage their houses and by the end of the fourth attempt in August 2012, most of her unpaid or underpaid team, which includes boatsman and expert navigator John Bartlett (Rhys Ifans) had given up. Bartlett, whose knowledge of the Gulf currents and weather were critical contributors to her success, died in 2013.
Despite knowing the outcome, the dynamic directorial team of Elizabeth Chai Vasahelyi and Jimmy Chin Diana, along with scriptwriter Julia Cox, find ways to inject suspense, tension and excitement into the story. Vashahelyi and Chin, who directed two nail-biting documentaries, Free Solo and The Rescue, are in familiar territory in this, their first feature film. They manage a great balancing act between chronicling the awesome logistics of the swim, which include shark and jelly fish experts, feeding schedules, hallucinations, a mechanism to ensure Diana swims straight ahead, etc, and the relationship, tested to the limit, between coach and swimmer.
The two lead actresses revel in their material, especially the humour and the tender friendship between their characters. They are the perfect leads in a film celebrating women over sixty (Foster is 60, Bening, 65) with their refusal to give up their professions and their dreams because of age. They ensure that this “triumph over adversity” film never becomes clichéd or sentimental. Diana is not easy to get along with. Her egocentric determination can be exhausting for those around her. But everyone recognises that she makes the hardest demands on herself.
Bening is sensational in expressing Diana’s euphoria, doubt, tears, stubborn tantrums, gratitude and in her unselfconscious physical performance. Foster manages to elevate her sidekick role to something special, and the scene in which the two discuss Diana’s abusive relationship with her childhood coach, Jack Nelson, adds to the timeliness of an already topical, but thoroughly entertaining film.
