Su Friedrich - 1990 — - Sink Or Swim ((better))

Narratively, Sink or Swim recounts the upbringing of a young girl (the filmmaker’s avatar) by her distant, authoritarian, and emotionally unavailable father. However, Friedrich employs a fascinating narrative device: the story is told in the third person. The narrator refers to the protagonist not as "I," but as "she" or "the daughter."

While the film is intensely autobiographical, Friedrich employs a on the soundtrack.

In the lexicon of late 20th-century American art, Sink or Swim is a monument to surviving the patriarchy. It is a film that says: You do not have to be defined by the person who threw you in the water. You can define yourself by the fact that you did not drown. Su Friedrich - 1990 - Sink or Swim

Friedrich is known for her mastery of the "found footage" aesthetic, and in Sink or Swim , the visual strategy is integral to the film's meaning. The images are almost entirely found footage—scientific diagrams, old educational films, home movies, and clips from Hollywood features.

| Letter | Title | Content Summary | |--------|-------|------------------| | A | Alphabet | Sets up the structure; a girl recites the ABCs. | | B | Break | A family vacation photo where the father stands apart. | | G | Girl | The narrator describes being a “tomboy” – her father’s disappointment. | | M | Monsters | Imagining her father as a monster (mythological and real). | | S | Sink or Swim | The pivotal memory – being thrown into a lake. | | W | Water | Recurring images of swimming pools, oceans, and bathtubs – safety vs. danger. | Narratively, Sink or Swim recounts the upbringing of

In one of the most devastating sequences (the letter for How to Be a Good Father ), Friedrich shows a 1950s instructional film. A wholesome, pipe-smoking actor teaches boys how to tie knots, swing a bat, and sit for a business lecture. As the narrator explains that her own father never taught her any of these things—that he preferred to lecture her on the migratory patterns of birds—the screen image begins to flicker and degrade. The celluloid warps. The "perfect" on-screen father melts into abstraction.

Su Friedrich’s Sink or Swim ends on a high-angle shot of a lake. The water is still. The girl is gone, somewhere beneath the surface, learning to kick. We do not see her triumph, only the ripples. In the lexicon of late 20th-century American art,

The most striking formal innovation of Sink or Swim is its rigid, almost Sphinx-like structure. The film is divided into 26 chapters, each titled with a successive letter of the alphabet, beginning with “A” and concluding with “Z.” This is not a gimmick; it is a survival mechanism.

Split Tooth Media. (2020). "Su Friedrich Reflects on 30 Years of 'Sink or Swim'." splittoothmedia.com . Lesson Plan: Su Friedrich's Sink or Swim

Senses of Cinema. (2000). "Sink or Swim." sensesofcinema.com .