The Swinger (1966)

Director:

George Sidney

Writer:

Lawrence Roman (writer)

Release Date:

29 September 1967 (Finland)

Genre:

Comedy

Tagline:

She swings like nothing ever swung!

Plot:

An authoress (Ann-Margret) writes a steaming sex-novel and proceeds to live out her heroine's adventures.

Plot Keywords:

Sexism | Father Daughter Relationship | Beautiful Woman | Sex Discrimination | Sex Magazine

Cast

Ann-Margret	...	Kelly Olsson
Anthony Franciosa	...	Ric Colby (as Tony Franciosa)
Robert Coote	...	Sir Hubert Charles
Yvonne Romain	...	Karen Charles
Horace McMahon	...	Detective Sergeant Hooker
Nydia Westman	...	Aunt Cora
Craig Hill	...	Sammy Jenkins
Milton Frome	...	Mr. Olsson
Mary LaRoche	...	Mrs. Olsson
Clete Roberts	...	Clete Roberts
Myrna Ross	...	Sally
Corinne Cole	...	Sir Hubert's Secretary
Bert Freed	...	Police Captain
Romo Vincent	...	Jack Happy
Steven Geray	...	Man with Fish

Runtime:

81 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Finland:K-16

Filming Locations:

Saks Fifth Avenue - 9600 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills, California, USA

Company:

Paramount Pictures

Trivia:

Ann-Margret rides a 500cc Triumph T100C Tiger motorcycle in the film. Later, she herself featured in Triumph Motorcycles's official advertisements in the USA.

Quotes:

Sir Hubert Charles: Sir Hubert doesn't like a challenge! Sir Hubert likes a sure thing!

Movie Connections:

Featured in "TCM Underground: The Swinger (#1.59)" (2009)

Soundtrack:

Oh So Bad

Not very good then, even worse now

"The Swinger" was an attempt by old-line Hollywood to cash in on the "youth movement" by making a movie that was "hip" and "relevant" and that the "young people" could "dig." It fails miserably on all counts. This movie was dated five minutes after it was released, and is now nothing more than a laughable relic of what people who had absolutely no idea of what the '60s were about thought the '60s were about.

Tony Franciosa plays a Hugh Hefner-type magazine publisher who rejects a story given to him by writer Ann-Margret about the "swinging" scene, because he doesn't think she knows enough about the subject to have written about it (while he, of course, knows EVERYTHING about it). So she sets out to become part of the swinging generation to show him up. The movie is nothing but leering, smarmy double-entendres, and the whole attitude is "ooh, aren't we being naughty?", which they aren't (as in the laughable "orgy" scene, where Ann-Margret gets her body painted).

Ann-Margaret has always seemed to me to be the Pamela Anderson of the '60s--a totally manufactured personality trading on her looks and what passes for sex appeal. Her image was the good girl who would stop just this side of sluttiness, because she was, after all, a good girl--which made her, basically, a tease, and that was what her entire career was built on. This movie is a perfect example of that. She's basically nothing more than a somewhat animated Barbie doll, which is pretty much all that she's ever been required to be.

If you want to get a feel for what the '60s was about, this movie isn't it, by any stretch of the imagination. It's fun in a goofball kind of way, but it's basically what a bunch of wealthy, middle-aged men (the people who made this movie) thought "the kids" would want to see. They didn't.