Splash
Year of release : 1984
Run time : 1h50m
Genre : Romance / Comedy
Cast : Tom Hanks, Daryl Hannah, Eugene Levy
Director : Ron Howard
In 1964, Allen is on a boat trip to Cape Cod with his parents and older brother. Allen is fascinated by the glistening of the water, and jumps in although he doesn’t know how to swim. Underwater he sees a little girl, and they hold hands. Allen is rescued, and years later, he thinks what he saw was a near death experience.
20 years later, Allen co-owns a fruit and vegetables business with his older brother, who is a womanizer, although he’s large.
His girlfriend Victoria, leaves him over the phone because he doesn’t love her, and after a wedding where everyone asks him about Victoria, Allen goes to Cape Cod (after getting drunk and taking a cab to Cape Cod on impulse), hoping to see the girl he saw underwater when he was a kid.
In Cape Cod, Allen meets a crazy scientist, who thinks he’s a spy sent by his superiors.
He hires a man with a boat, and ends up stranded in the middle of the ocean, as the boat stops working, and the man swims back to get another boat, as it’s only a few miles to the dock!
Although he still can’t swim, Allen messes with the boat, and falls off it, being hit by it ,when it starts working again!
He is rescued by the same mermaid he saw when he was a kid, and left on the shore.
After meeting him, kissing him and making sure he’s safe, she jumps back into the water, and finds his wallet.
The scientist sees her, and tries to take a picture of her, but misses.
Allen is back in New York, and the mermaid comes to New York with his wallet. She causes quite a stir, as she appears naked at the Statue of Liberty, and gets in the newspapers.
The police take her and give her a t-shirt. They call Allen, who, when hearing about it, rushes in, to see her. When she sees him ,she kisses him again. She seems to really like him, as she kisses him a lot! She can’t speak, but that is not a problem.
When Allen has to go back to work, she leaves with his credit card, and buys herself a lot of clothes, and spends the whole day in front of the tvs displayed in a shop, learning English.
The crazy scientist sees her in the newspaper, and recognizes her, telling his peers about it, who laugh at him. Due to it, he is dead set on proving she is a mermaid.
Allen starts missing days off work, spending time with her, and asking her about what her name is, she choses the name Madison.
Somehow, the crazy scientist finds her (the only way it would be possible is if the newspapers knew about Allen’s ID that she had on, and took his address, but I doubt the police would give them his address and they’d put it in the newspapers at the time).
Wherever they go, the mad scientist follows them, trying to splash water on her, so she would turn into a mermaid, to prove he’s correct. Problem is, he keeps on finding the same couple, and it seems he’s targeting that man’s wife!
I personally enjoyed the movie, it was funny. I liked the mermaid, who’s in town only for 6 days, and if she stays for longer she can’t ever go back home. She gets legs if she’s dry, if wet, her tail grows back.
I liked the fact she came to New York for Allen, because she loved him.
There’s some pretty amazing underwater scenes, which look real. Daryl Hannah had to spend a lot of time underwater.
The acting was good.
I didn’t like the soundtrack.
The visual effects were good. A good portion of the movie is spent in water, Daryl Hannah is in water as a mermaid for quite some time, and the scenes look amazing! I also loved her tail, which looked real.
Splash was a critical and commercial success, grossing almost 70 million dollars at the box office against an 11 million dollars budget, being the 10th highest grossing movie of the year 1984.
It’s the first movie made by Touchstone Pictures, a Disney label created to target mature audiences. Which begs the question, if Disney could make such movies in 1984, how did they make the live action Little Mermaid looking the way it did in 2023?!
Actresses like Michelle Pfeiffer, Sharon Stone, Diane Lane, Kathleen Turner, Melanie Griffith were offered the role of the mermaid. Bill Murray and John Travolta were among the actors considered to play Allen.
The movie received a few award nominations, including for an Oscar (for Best Original Screenplay) and a Golden Globe (for best Motion Picture Musical or Comedy).
Viewer discretion is advised, as the movie contains nudity from Daryl Hannah.
You can watch the full movie for free, on the Ok.Ru platform.
Rating : Worth a watch !