Swimfan

Hola Gasmii!  P-Baby Walker here coming out of summer hiding because I’m bored and have been laid up in bed pooping my pants after returning from a trip to Mexico.  Between runs to the bathroom and dragging my sorry ass to the kitchen for toast and ginger ale, I’ve been watching a shit load of 1. Melrose Place (streaming EVERY SEASON on Netflix) so I can ogle Grant Show’s abs and curse Amanda from the comfort of my own bedroom and 2. Really bad movies.  I decided one really bad movie in particular needed a little extra loving mainly because it reminds me a lot of Fear, only the actors didn’t go on to be respected A listers and the swimming pool sex scene was nowhere near as hot as the roller coaster finger bang.  I’m not sure anything ever will be.

In other news, my roller coaster experiences tend to look more like this.

Back in 2002, a movie called Swimfan reared its ugly 85 minute head to the masses and against my better judgment, I loved it immediately.  For some reason I feel obligated to gravitate towards movies involving a spurned, psychotic lover.  Maybe in a past life I was Glenn Close.

First and foremost, if a movie comes out that is less than 90 minutes long, it’s obviously going to be absolutely terrible.  Essentially the screenwriter is saying, “Nope, I really could not come up with five more minutes of dialogue, plot, or interesting scenery to throw in because my movie sucks so bad and I want to end this misery as soon as possible.”  An 85 minute film is basically the equivalent of wearing sweatpants to church.  Lazy, thoughtless, and reeking of giving up.

So, moving on, we open with Jesse Bradford aka Ben and that chick from Roswell indulging in ill-advised vehicular  coitus over beautiful cello music and courier font confirming that no one from this movie went on to have a career.  Well, maybe Jason Ritter can claim otherwise but only because I liked his Dad in Problem Child.

Ben is a popular, mouth-breathing star of the high school swim team.  You know the type.  Cute, kind of stupid, and most likely going off to a college he doesn’t deserve to attend because his athletic prowess allows him such benefits.  We’ll forgive him this time for being an entitled jock because he’s pulling off cute pretty well for an early 2000′s movie.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said about this fool.

Ben’s life has been easy so far and is most recently consumed by his coach Dan Hedaya informing him that college recruiters from Stanford are going to be at his next swim meet.  All of his friends including the token sassy black friend are excited for him but his stick in the mud girlfriend Roswell is too busy moping about the possibility of her going to school in Rhode Island and Ben being in California to be happy.  Bitch, please.  Don’t even pretend like you won’t be giving Rhode Island fratties BJs in a dirty bathroom like 5 minutes after arriving at the dorms.  I’ve never understood why high schoolers think their stupid, shallow relationships are worth giving up four years of slutting and boozing around college because clearly that’s way more awesome than nagging conversations on AOL instant messenger about how much you miss each other.  Or whatever the kids use these days.

Ben’s all, “Relax, I totally love you and even if I stick it in Stanford cheerleaders time and again, nothing will change that.”  He presents Roswell with a crappy necklace and all is right again in the world of needy relationships.

PS.  Completely off topic.  I broke up with my high school senior boyfriend via AOL Instant Messenger.  Before you say, “P-Baby you should have done it in person!” he was a loser that was cheating on me with a freshman.  The conversation went something like this.

IHeartBSB: “hey are you there”

WeedRox69: “yo”

IHeartBSB: “I can’t go to the beach with you this weekend and I don’t think we should be together anymore.”

WeedRox69: “whoa, what’s the deal yo, I thought we were doin’ aight”

Pointless chit chat ensues, including my declaration of waning feelings and distaste for his weed habit that was giving him slowly developing moobs.

IHeartBSB: “well I better get to bed, I hope you have a good night”

WeedRox69: “aight. Peace.”

Ahh…memories.

So anyway, literally 30 seconds after Ben gets done professing his undying love for his succubus girlfriend, a new blonde dish named Madison is in the hallway asking for Ben’s help to open her locker which is really just code for “I want to suck you dry.”  I had lockers from 6th grade to 12th grade and never once was I unable to figure out how to open that shit up.  Maybe my fingers doth be more nimble than this moron but really, I’d just be too proud to pretend that I was having trouble INPUTTING THREE NUMBERS into a lock, thereby causing supposed cute hunky locker savior to think I was an idiot.  I hope Madison’s fallback career is not that of safecracker.

Ben, on the other hand, is a master at breaking into things and smoothly requests Madison’s hair pin to pick the lock, jimmying open after a few clicky clicks.  Look, people.  I’ve been locked out of places before, whether purposely or drunkenly.  It’s not that easy to pick a lock.  I’ve lost many an important plastic card behind doors and I blame movies such as this for making me think I’m a regular member of the Italian Job crew.  I hate Ben and is smarmy mouthbreathing ways.

Madison gifts Ben the hair pin for rescuing her from carrying her shit around school all day.  She eye fucks him a little while engaging in small talk.  Sensing that Madison is about to pass out from lack of oxygen intake, Ben takes his open orifice down the hallway and off to his after school job since the writers had to put off the adulterous fucking for at least another 30 minutes.

I suppose Ben had to have some redeeming qualities about him so his job is that of doling out pills to old people at some senior home or hospital or some other non-descript building that houses geriatrics.  I don’t for one second believe that a high school jock would ever 1. Want this job 2.  Not inadvertently murder anyone and 3. Not steal said pills for personal consumption.  Whatever.  It’s probably the only job Ben could get since all those old people are on oxygen tanks anyway.

Back at the land of fucking terrible ideas, Roswell decides that she might want to go to Berkeley instead of whatever crappy college she was going to in Rhode Island in order to be closer to Ben.  Call me a pessimist but I feel as though midway through senior year might put Roswell a little behind the power curve on Berkeley’s admissions process.  But hey, it makes Ben happy so who cares if Roswell is going to turn the best years of his life into absolute misery.

At swim practice the next day Ben has locker room talk with his hot douchey friend about Madison and how Ben’s hot douchey friend wants to get after that ass.  There’s some chatting about  what brought her to the school, her family being in Europe, her totally sweet tits etc, but really, Ben’s friend is hot.

Driving home after depleting the school of breathable air, Ben almost runs Madison over as she chooses to stand in the middle of the road as opposed to the sidewalk three feet away.  Instead of cussing her out for jaywalking like yours truly would have done, Ben apologizes and insists on giving her a ride home.

After dropping Fatal Attraction off, Ben notices that Madison left behind a journal of some sort.  Well, turns out it’s actually a music writing book.  In the book, Ben notices the initials of B.C. which his narcissistic ass immediately assumes must be him.  Well, he really shouldn’t have read the thing to begin with but I won’t even pretend like I wouldn’t have done the same thing.

Ben takes the book over to Madison’s house to drop off and is greeted by her cousin Christopher who tries to cut him off at the pass by intercepting the book.  Christopher is really sweet and obviously scared shitless of Madison who looks like she wants to cut a bitch for not telling her someone was there to see her.  Madison manipulates Ben into going out for a meal and we find out that the reason why Ben is so good at breaking into things.  Apparently Ben used to do drugs and steal stuff.  So off to juvenile hall he went where he found out he’s some kind of Rain Man swimmer after being tasked to clean the pool.

Instead of being all judgy and side-eyeing like a normal, all-American teenage girl not wanting to date someone with baggage, Fatal Attraction starts babbling about how she totally gets it, how when she plays her music on the cello she feels like she can escape.  I played the cello for 13 years.  Bitch is lying.  I used to cry at my Asian mom on the regular because I didn’t want to practice and wanted to go to the mall or something stupid like that.

At this point, Ben can sense Madison is growing attached and may have more than a friendly interest in him, what with the locker save, the ride home, the personal visit, and now a meal out.  Madison laughs it off, knowing she could choke out Roswell without so much as a peep, and asks if it’s a serious relationship.  Obviously not, despite Ben’s declarations, since he decides on taking Madison to the swimming pool instead of home were her crazy ass belongs.

At the pool, Ben shows off his black hole-esque lung capacity by swimming laps while Madison sits on the side watching in her bra and undies.  At what point does Ben’s serious girlfriend cross his mind?

One time when I was a freshman, this senior track star took me to his house instead of to the mall like he told my parents and he showed me home movies of his track meets that were sent to college recruiters for what felt like hours.  Believe me when I say that not only did it make me want to have sex with him, I didn’t so much as kiss the idiot.  He took me home and never talked to me again.  Point is, Ben has no game.

Madison decides to enter the pool even though she says she can’t swim because how else is she going to seduce Ben into totally hot chlorine burning sex?

So after 30 seconds of swimming lessons which is just an excuse for underwater petting, this happens:

Some inserting of things and squirming happen and then Madison says what would typically kill most guys’ boners instantly during illicit cheating sex.

Ben, what say you?

…is what Ben should have said.  Rather, he goes along with Fatal Attraction’s request, which is pretty much the stupidest thing ever besides the fact that they are clearly banging sans rubber which is even stupider though I hear chlorine kills pretty much everything.

During the drive of shame home, Ben feels like the dirty dog he is but Madison puts his worries at ease by requesting he not tell anyone.  I’m pretty sure that was the plan there, Maddy, from right about the time this happened:

Ben wakes up the next morning with a needy phone call from Roswell whining about how he blew her off the night before.  Instead of being pissed like she should be, she instead has left a surprise for Ben at his locker. He finds some little flowers tucked into the lock and a note inside declaring that Roswell is proud of him and loves having him in her mouth life.  Seriously, is this dude’s wiener made of gold or something?  Why is Roswell so up in his shit when he steals all her air, stands her up, and basically treats her like a second thought?

Ben goes to find Roswell and thank her for the thoughtful gesture and quickly realizes that the flowers were not from Roswell as she assumes they are for her when she sees them.  This leaves Ben unsettled but he doesn’t have time to overanalyze as he’s gots to get his swim on and suffocate his teammates.

Ben attends a party that evening where Roswell is also in attendance.  Roswell is super excited to introduce her new BFF Madison to Ben who immediately shits his pants when he realizes Roswell has befriended his secret fuck.

Saving Ben from totally meltdown is his hot swimming friend who hits on Madison at the party.  Meanwhile, Ben wipes himself down in the bathroom, providing Madison the perfect opportunity to corner him and question when she gets him all to herself again.  She then lets Ben know that her panties are in his car…the exact car that Roswell is busy weaseling her whiny ass into at that moment.  Ben enjoys a narrow miss, keeping Roswell in the dark on his sexcapades.  Roswell at this point is a non-entity.  I don’t doubt that life and sex in general for Ben would be way hotter with Madison.  He’s a high school boy.  He needs to just cut the cord and stick with the psycho.

Since this movie has completely disregarded timelines and sensical segues, the next scene has Ben at a computer lab looking up swimming stuff when he receives an instant message from SwimFan85 aka Madison sexually harassing the shit out of him.

Ben takes the high road (Note to Ben:  That high road ship sailed like fifteen minutes.) and blows her off.  She gets pissed and ends up signing off.  Ben’s life is slowly circling the drain at this point as his coach lectures him about his swimming times getting slower.  During the lecture, Madison incessantly beeps him…yes, I said beeps, prompting Coach to tell Ben to ease up on the pussy and figure it out.

Arriving at home, Ben hangs his car keys on one of those really ill-advised key hanger things that allows any intruder to have access to every locked item that belongs to you in one swoop.  Minor detail but as this is a thriller, obviously we are supposed to take note of it.  Another reason we are supposed to take note is because of the 10 second close up of it.  I can’t find a screen shot but it basically looks like this:

Ben hears voices and discovers Madison in his living room with his mom.  Ben resorts to the thing he does best.  And no, it’s not swimming or cheating on his stupid girlfriend.

Ben essentially tells Madison that bagging her in the swimming pool was the worst mistake of his life and to get the fuck out of his house.  She’s hurt that he’s less than thrilled to see her and leaves after indicating she won’t tell anyone about their secret.  But, it looks like she might be plotting something in that demented little head of hers. How do I know this?

The next day at breakfast Ben’s mom scolds him for not clubbing…yes clubbing as in The Club…his car.  Ben’s mom needs to get a grip.  From what I can tell they live in a fairly decent, suburban neighborhood where it’s safe to assume that no one is interested in stealing Ben’s 1986 Ford F-150.  Whatever.  And really, The Club?  Ben of all people should know that thing is a piece of shit.

Back at the computer lab, Ben discovers approximately 5000 unread emails from SwimFan85 containing pictures of good old SwimFan85 with her jublies hanging out.  Ben is sufficiently creeped out at this point though most red-blooded hormonal guys would think that was fucking awesome.  Ben decides at that moment if he’s going down, he’s taking the rest of the computer lab down with him by way of smothering.

Roswell once again with her sixth sense for turning up at the worst possible moments peeks her perky face around the monitor and surprises Ben.  The reason for the visit is to entice Ben to come over to her unsupervised empty house for a rousing night of vanilla, missionary style sex.  Ben is frantically wishing for a panic button on the monitor and manages to ditch the nudie photos before Roswell notices but pisses her off anyway by turning down her advances.

At swim practice, Fatal Attraction pops up again only this time she’s there for Ben’s hot friend (who she really should have been going after from the get go) and makes out with Hot Friend in front of Ben.  Ben voices his approval of the new relationship but there’s still 44 minutes left and I’m sure Fatal Attraction has a few more tricks up her sleeve.

Since we are at the halfway point, I’d like to bring to everyone’s attention a fatal plot hole.  How is Ben turning down this…

for this…

Right?  Right?!?!??

Ok, so after a pretty intense showdown in the locker room after swim practice where Madison is all “Why don’t you call me, I love you, be mine or rot in hell” and Ben is all “I’m with Roswell, I have to work, I have to swim, why won’t you get off my back you psychotic hose beast,” Ben is off to work with the old people again handing out their meds and generally wishing he was dead.  He makes the vital mistake of leaving his drug cart unsupervised and old Madison manages to fuck with all the meds and mess up the old peoples’ bowel movements or whatever they take pills for.  Ben gets fired and he quickly realizes this was another way that Fatal Attraction has fucked him over.

Ben pays the bunny boiler a visit and tells her whilst choking her to cut out the psycho shit and leave him alone.  But really, is choking your stalker who has already proved willing to slaughter a home full of old people the smartest move in a game of crazy?

The answer to that question is no, as Ben finds out, because the next day at school, he walks in to a whole bunch of judgy stares and realizes that Roswell has found out about the pool bang.  Cue sad music montage of slap across the face, angst ridden, wistful, longing stares across dark coffee houses and parking lots, and…a urine drug test before the swim meet.  Because that fits in with the rest.

Time for the big swim meet with the Stanford scouts.  Unfortunately, Ben will not be participating today because his urine tested positive for anabolic steroids.  Fatal plot hole number 2.  Ben is built like a twelve year old muscular girl who probably gets picked first in gym class but isn’t actually good at sports.

Ben:

Anabolic steroid user:

Ben:

Anabolic steroid user:

Coach kicks Ben off the swim team and I really just want for him to jump in front of a bus and put Roswell, Madison, Jason Ritter, and the rest of us out of our misery.  Ben accuses his hot friend of helping Madison rig the drug test, thereby putting Hot Friend at the top of the list for the college scouts.  Ben heads home and his mom totally accuses him of being all strung out again, saying that his drug use started exactly the same way last time.  So Ben’s drug use started with anabolic steroids and spiraled into what?  Weed?  Huffing?  What the fuck is this lady even talking about?  If I’m Ben at this point, I’m giving everyone the finger, driving off in my clubbed dumpy pick up truck and heading for the border.   Mexico or Canada, it matters not.

Ben turns to Roswell and begs her to believe him that the pee test was rigged but seeing as he’s the douche that just fucked another chick, Roswell’s bullshit flag is flying high.  Across town, Madison and Hot Friend are engaging in what will only lead to third base when she starts calling Hot Friend Ben’s name.  Hot Friend is all put out because 1. He’s hotter than Ben 2.  He’s just now realizing his girlfriend is nuts and his days are numbered.

Ben heads back to the pool to clean out his locker.  Even though Ben is quite the amphibious athlete, he keeps a baseball bat in his locker.

Ben decides to clear his mind by taking one last swim around the pool.  During this swim, he bumps into Hot Friend’s dead bleeding body floating face down.  So, he didn’t notice the bloodied corpse before diving in?

As expected, Hot Friend was bludgeoned to death by the baseball bat that had Ben’s fingerprints all over it, so now not only is he an anabolic steroid drug user but he’s a murderer as well, all thanks to Crazypants.  Ben finally decides to grow a pair and heads to Madison’s house only this time he’s pulling his own stunt by breaking into her room unannounced in order to find evidence of all her wrongdoings.  He indeed finds evidence of her being at his place of work, a bottle of anabolic steroid meds, and a totally normal box of Ben related items such as swimming goggles, newspaper articles, and a picture of Ben and Roswell only instead of Roswell, Madison glued her chemically imbalanced head to the photo.

Christopher discovers Ben rummaging through Madison’s stuff but since Christopher is adorable, he gives Ben a box or something and shoves him out of the house before Madison can find out he’s there.

In the box, Ben finds a whole bunch of newspaper clippings about some poor son of a bitch named Jake Donnelly who was apparently a high school star baseball player and Madison’s former object of affection.  Christopher decides this is an appropriate time for an impromptu drive to New York City so Ben can meet Jake Donnelly.  The fuck?  Who even knew they were close enough to drive to New York City?

Meanwhile back in whatever the fuck state these assholes live in, Madison has put on a baseball cap, magically transforming herself from curvaceous hot chick to slim built swimmer douche guy.  She’s also has managed to hijack Ben’s stupid truck (the KEYS!  the CLUB!) and is off on some murderous spree somewhere.

Off topic:  I fucking love the movie Bad Influence and for some reason I just thought of it.  Rob Lowe was SO sexy in that movie and a complete and utter psychopath.  Why do I love people that are obviously mentally unhealthy?  My crush as of late has been Brian Wilson of the crazy beard, crazy rants, closing San Francisco Giants games because he has that unstable look in his eye and tattoos all over him.  Back to Bad Influence. I kind of think James Spader would have rocked the Rob Lowe role even better but it was fun seeing the super hot sex scene, 80s bush, and Rob Lowe’s cute little butt like 30 seconds into the movie.

Back to Ben, who has discovered Jake Donnelly is laid up in bed with some tubes going up his nose (Thank God, because Ben’s greedy ass sure as shit wasn’t about to let that sucker get any air on his watch) and realizes that Jake’s condition is courtesy of Madison and a car accident the two were in back in the day where she was conveniently wearing her seatbelt and he was not.

While visiting Jake, Ben’s beeper…the fucking beeper…goes off and it’s his mom calling to tell him that Roswell was just brought into the hospital after being run off the road on her stupid Vespa and everyone is saying Ben is the culprit.  In a flash, he snags Jake’s letterman jacket out of his room and takes off back home (Where that is, who the fuck knows) to make sure Roswell is protected from Madison.

Madison, meanwhile, has ditched the man threads and is now posing as a doctor at the hospital where Roswell is currently a patient at because what would this movie be without a 17 year old pretending to be a doctor and NO ONE NOTICING WHO WORKS THERE.

As Madison stalks down the hallway, scalpel (of course) in hand to take out Roswell, Jake Donnelly is paged over the intercom repeatedly.  Madison then has a vision of Jake and follows him out to the parking lot only to discover it’s…CHRISTOPHER!  She swipes at him with the scalpel and gets the tables turned pretty quickly by Ben who really should stop delaying the inevitable and end the bitch now.  But then the movie would only be 70 minutes and an even bigger failure than it already is.

After some chatting with Madison essentially admitting to all the shit she’s done over the past whatever, week or year or so, Ben points out that everything has been filmed by the token sassy black friend who has materialized out of nowhere.  Madison gets cuffed and taken away and all is well.

Except…

Obviously, Madison escapes.   After about ten minutes of filler and spooky music, Ben’s doorbell rings, he gets clocked over the head with a trophy, Roswell is missing, and things have gone to hell in a handbasket in literally 15 seconds.  Ben’s beeper…I want to fucking destroy his motherfucking beeper…goes off inviting Ben to take a dip in the pool.  Roswell’s there handcuffed to a chair and Fatal Attraction is there screaming about how no one will love Ben the way she does.  She throws Roswell in the pool and Ben dives down to save her.  Since he DOESN’T use anabolic steroids, he’s unable to lift Roswell and chair up.  What he does, however, is find Madison’s hair pin in his pocket, pick the handcuffs and bring Roswell back up for air.

A couple of things.  First, ewww to how many days Ben wear his jeans without washing or removing them. Secondly, as if Roswell would get enough air supply within a 20 foot radius of this after almost drowning:

While the rescue is happening Madison is attempting to beat Ben over the head with one of those pool cleaning sticks so Ben does the first smart thing ever in his whole life and pulls her into the pool since homegirl can’t swim.  While she splashes around, Ben pulls Roswell out of the pool and it looks like he’s finally changing his selfish, oxygen-stealing ways.

So after all that, Fatal Attraction drowns in the pool which, really?  She’s smarter than that.  But I guess it has to tie somehow back to swimming to bring it all full circle.

Oh, Roswell forgives Ben for everything because of his golden penis.  And because she’s fucking stupid.