Review

Young Woman and the Sea (2024) Review: Daisy Ridley Triumphs in This Inspirational, Old-Fashioned Sports Biopic

Young Woman and the Sea is brimming with sport-movie cliché, all classically made in an old-fashioned inspirational story of persistence and defying the odds. It’s the kind of a feel-good movie that’s big on the heart while leaving you cheering for the protagonist, which in this case, Gertrude Ederle a.k.a. Trudy. She’s a New York-born swimmer who famously held numerous world records and most of all, made history as the first woman to swim across the English Channel in 1926.

Based on Glenn Stout’s 2009 book of the same name, this incredible true story is a stuff that Hollywood loves to make. Joachim Rønning, returning to the director’s chair for the first time in seven years since Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (or subtitled Salazar’s Revenge for the international market) does a better-than-expected job for a sports drama that goes for the conventional route.

Written by Jeff Nathanson, the movie follows Trudy’s life from her childhood (played by Olive Abercrombie) in 1914 as she miraculously survives a near-death experience after overcoming measles. Her mother, Gertrude (Jeanette Hain) wants her butcher husband, Henry (Kim Bodnia) to teach Trudy how to swim, which later becomes her lifelong passion.

Now growing up as a young woman (Daisy Ridley), she and her older sister Meg (Tilda Cobham-Hervey) take formal swimming lessons together under the guidance of Charlotte Epstein (Sian Clifford). It was Trudy who excelled the most in the swimming sports as she continued to improve her technique, going as far as impressing everyone. She soon joins the local swimming competitions, winning medals and breaking records, leading her to finally participate in the 1924 Paris Olympics.

Then comes her biggest challenge yet and that is, swimming across the English Channel, a feat that no woman has ever attempted before until now. The movie addresses the bygone era where sexism happens in male-dominated swimming sports. Rønning doesn’t sugarcoat the brutal reality of how women are grossly overlooked at the time when comes to swimming competitions.

But the headstrong Trudy refuses to give up, even though at one point, we see her momentarily surrender her dream to help out her father in the butcher’s shop. Even Meg tells her “Your future, it’s already been decided“, suggesting there’s no place for women to be treated with respect in the world of competitive swimming.

“None of it matters, Trudy. Do you think people around here care if you win or lose? Two girls from the butcher’s shop? We can’t win. People… They don’t want us to be heroes. They don’t want us to be anything.”

Of course, it doesn’t take long before Trudy insists on continuing to pursue her dream with the second half of the movie dedicated to her quest for fulfilling the English Channel challenge.

Young Woman and the Sea is compulsively watchable due to Daisy Ridley’s engaging yet likeable performance as the titular character. It’s hard not to root for her sheer determination no matter the obstacles she has to face, one of which includes a daring moment where she has to swim through a smack of (CG) red jellyfish. The entire English Channel set piece is thrillingly staged with Oscar Faura’s matter-of-fact cinematography successfully capturing the harsh elements of the rough waves, freezing-cold water and erratic weather patterns. It also helps that Rønning insists on shooting the movie as real as it gets with Ridley herself reportedly training for three months with the Olympic silver medalist Siobhan-Marie O’Connor.

Even before the crucial English Channel moment, Rønning manages to strike a fine balance between Trudy’s swimming period and the riveting drama dealing with prejudice and internal family matters. The latter is especially true with Trudy’s father, who initially doesn’t feel the same way as her mother does for seeing their daughter engaged in competitive swimming. Kim Bodnia and Jeanette Hain, who play Trudy’s parents, deliver solid supporting turns in their respective roles. The same also goes for Tilda Cobham-Hervey as Meg and Sian Clifford in her role as a no-nonsense swimming coach, Charlotte Epstein. Others who are equally worth mentioning here include Stephen Graham as the oddball Bill Burgess, who has experience in swimming across the English Channel and Christopher Eccleston as the misogynistic swim trainer, Jabez Wolffe.

Young Woman and the Sea is currently streaming on Disney+.