The Icebergs pool at Bondi is one, if not the, most photographed, instagramable, destination swimming spots in the world. If you live in Sydney, chances are at some point you’ll be there. If you live on the other side of the world, chances are it’s somewhere you’re going to make time for when you visit. And there’s a lot of people who can’t get through a week without immersing themselves in its waters. So it seems perfectly natural that someone came along to make a record, a long-form snapshot of the place, and the people who spend time there. The filmmakers have said they imagine The Pool as a time capsule, and so it is fitting that there is an intentional lack of story arc or deep connection to subjects. Snippets of interviews that are incorporated into the film have the lightest touch with the personal, even bordering on the mundane, avoiding any particular characters moving to the front of the narrative. Instead the film takes the shape of the grand old pool itself, and studies how it carries all it’s swimmers along, both physically and emotionally, like a hippo carrying small birds on it’s back, with endless capacity, refreshed every day by a sunrise, and every moment by a new wave crashing in. Long, achingly beautiful shots of the water and all the glistening sun- kissed reasons that Icebergs is so famous are captured magnificently by Ben Cunningham. It sometimes feels closer to a retro surf film, or an art video, meditative, and stretching out through a largely 60s inspired soundtrack, with a photographic focus on the moment. Icebergs is beloved by many and has lots of layers, and even focussing on the members and the present is only scratching the surface, but it’s a lovely way to inspire a whole range of people to get back in the water.
directed by Ian Darling
produced by Mary Macrae and Ian Darling
editor Sally Fryer
director of photography Ben Cunningham
composer & sound design Paul Charlier
executive produced by Margaret Simpson- Lee, Paul Wiegard, Geralyn White Dreyfous, and Kate Hodges.
from Shark Island Productions
In cinemas November 7th
Premiered at Sydney Film Festival 2024
Currently touring through Sunshine Coast Film Festival, Byron Bay Film Festival and Adelaide Film Festival.
Starring a multitude of swimmers and members of Bondi Icebergs Club
Irresistible sat down with the director Ian Darling, after a few laps at Icebergs, to test the waters.
What led you to The Pool?
“Coming out of Covid I wondered if I really wanted to carry on making documentaries. I wrote a play with two friends, The Twins, which on one level was all about me exploring a long- held dream of acting. But it was about privilege and heroin addictions, fathers and friendships, things we have lost and things that we want. My great friend Greg Fleet and I performed week- in, week- out, a two person 90-minute show. Although it played to full houses, it cured any ideas I had of being on the stage. I realised I wasn’t a good enough actor, and my time had gone, but not before we’d put on 85 performances across Australia!
I was looking for a positive and happy story, a film that could bring an audience joy. As documentary filmmakers, we can feel like we have to be doing something heavy all the time, wearing the hair shirt. Covid made me a much more regular swimmer, and an enjoyer of cold water. In the Icebergs cafe one day I asked Margie Simpson- Lee, who would go on to be an executive producer of The Pool, ‘Where do you find a happy story these days?’ and she said, ‘What about here?’
Sometimes it’s so obvious. What you’re looking for is right in front of you. Icebergs has everything I wanted; community, shared values, connection. I had to give myself permission to make something positive that might simply bring joy. I had to allow myself to not always be trying to change policy or shift minds.”
What did you learn about yourself when you were acting?
“We were two vulnerable men in their midlife talking about all the things that matter most to us. There was nowhere to hide, I was terrified to go out and chat to the audience after the shows in the first week, I felt completely exposed and full of shame. But slowly I ventured into the crowd and heard how everyone related. Our friends are so important; how they pick up the pieces, let us down, fall through the cracks, ring us up when we need it. A well- known actor held us after one show in tears. asking ‘How can we stop fucking our lives up?’ I was shocked at first, but then learnt everyone is the same, me included. We’ve all got an underbelly, a vulnerability, and we all need the same things – community, friends. We all want to come together.
I realised I want to enable people to dream, and to look at their own lives and their community. Particularly since Covid I think those who don’t have community are yearning for it, and those that do have it are more aware of how precious it is. I think I just want to help people reach out to each other.”
What does Bondi Icebergs mean to you now?
“Even though that cameras have stopped rolling, I still feel so welcome. The people down at the pool could have been difficult or reticent during the lengthy filming process, but they embraced it. We initially made 100 interviews with swimming members that represent the community at the pool, and these conversations were intended as an archival time capsule for the film’s website. They aren’t in the film, rather they enabled us to really get to know members and build their trust. Since we’ve wrapped though, four of those interviewees have died, a number have life changing illnesses, others have had babies, some have lost close friends, some have had extraordinarily positive things happen to them. It’s surprising how much has happened to the community, and at the same time it isn’t.
I’ve been to the funeral services of those who have died, and it’s really driven home to me how special everyone is to the Icebergs family, and what amazing stories and wisdom the older generations have. I wish I’d known some of the things I only found out at the funerals. I tell my daughters to go out and have conversations with older people, grab those moments, hear those snippets of history. There’s a whole generation that is passing on at the moment with so much to share.
It was Bondi and the water that kept me in Sydney in the 90s. I love swimming and luckily the film crew did too. We swam in the pool for 99 of the 100 days we filmed at Icebergs. The craziness of the world falls away as swimmers strip off the layers. Everything is washed off the moment you get in the water. It’s a moment of happiness as the outside world falls away.”
The Pool is not a traditional film- how did you decide how to lay it out?
“There is no five character structure, no story arc. The rule- breaking was completely intentional. Early on we decided The Pool would be visual and meditative. We realised the pool itself was the main character and we wanted to know more about it. We have a long opening sequence that sets up the contract- it’s about taking in the cinematography and the music. I’m a great believer in finding the right individual rhythm of a film. All my documentaries have a different one. The Pool is cinematic, every shot if set up as a masterpiece, and we played with how it looked, the lenses, the duration of the shots.
Surf movies like Endless Summer were a great inspiration. There’s no obvious intention beyond the thing itself. The 60s palate was perfect as for us, Australian beach and surf culture really took off in the 60s. That decade also feels similar to now- full of threats and war and uncertainty, but with pockets of joy and upbeat music. The music in the film is crucial, and as well as 60s hits, we incorporated retro contemporary female surf bands from Seattle to Japan. Every track features the guitar. In fact, our music director Paul Charlier found a piece of 1680s Baroque music which was the first score that included guitar.
Our crew was small but we used incredibly high-end lenses and equipment and shot with the Sony Venice camera, the same that was used on the latest Top Gun film. With Ben Cunningham our cinematographer, every shot of every event, however minor, became a beautiful portrait just in itself.”
What do you see as the thread running through the work that you’re most proud of?
“I think the thing that has made films work for me is when I’ve got the right balance between distance and connection. I have to have some real interest in the subject. For every film you make more probably fall over. Those that haven’t worked for me is when there wasn’t a strong enough connection. Other filmmakers can, but I don’t think I can make a film about someone I don’t like or something I’m not really invested in. At the same time, there has to be some distance for all the normal reasons of objectivity. I’m not an Iceberger, for example. I don’t do the winter swimming.
The other thing I really appreciate is people seeing themselves in my films and relating in a profound way. A woman spoke to me after seeing The Pool and thanked me for making a film about her book club. She got the deeper meaning.”
Which of your documentaries do you think had the biggest impact?
“In 2008 we made The Oasis, a film about Australia’s homeless youth. We helped put homelessness on the national agenda. We had a huge screening on the ABC, and a national enquiry which generated the first major report on the issue for 20 years. To their credit the Rudd government produced their own Green Paper and then White Paper and poured billions into the sector. That film went to every school and politician and it looked as though for the first time in Australia we were going to really develop a way of dealing with homelessness. Then we had 5 new prime ministers, 3 changes of government, and all that momentum just got lost. From that initial excitement and one of the highest impact documentaries Australia has ever seen, we’re still dealing with over 100,000 homeless people. Back then there were objectives to halve homelessness, but now it’s only become worse.
The lack of infrastructure and the stripping out of essential services, the totally inadequate state government funding, it’s all part of the problem. You can’t fix homelessness with a broken child protection system. Media reports beat up on the social work departments and the social workers themselves. There’s enormous burnout and 30% turnover in staff. These are some of the most underfunded and dedicated people in society doing the hardest jobs, the stress of which they take home to their own families.
So yes, it was initially high impact, but maintaining momentum, saving the hard work people have done, making change, it’s really difficult. You have to be prepared to go into battle every single time, every single day.”
What do you want the social impact of The Pool to be?
“Funds from philanthropic donors to the The Pool film have been channelled into a three-year outreach partnership with the Float to Survive water safety programme, which will be going national over the next few years. The founder is high profile Bondi lifeguard, Hoppo, so working with him and maximising impact will be a priority. The Pool film is encouraging people to swim and connect, and the outreach programme is keeping people safe.”
You’ve worn a lot of different hats in your life- which hat are you most comfortable wearing now?
“At 37 I didn’t know where my talents lay. I studied and worked in the worlds of finance, brokering and investment management, none of which I regret, but I wanted to make a documentary. It seemed an elegant choice for my first subject to be Warren Buffet as I had always used his business philosophies as a blueprint. When I told my father about the film he said ‘What would people think?’ He was a great photographer and we had a wonderful relationship, but he didn’t appreciate the arts like I did. After Woodstock for Capitalists came out he said, ‘Well now you have that out of your system, you can go back to business.’ But for me it was the opposite, the door had been opened and I started planning my exit from the world of finance.
What took a lot longer was giving myself the freedom to call myself a full time filmmaker. Before then it was on the side, I was hiding behind the label of being a part- timer, doing work which I could tell myself was really good considering I had lots of other jobs. I thought if I’m not really prepared to get in the arena, have tomatoes thrown at me, carry that emotional risk, I wouldn’t be able to honour my craft and hone it.
I was on a lot of arts and non- profit’s boards over the years. Some of my best experiences were when I was the chair of Sydney Theatre Company, and working with Cate Blanchett and Andrew Upton was exhilarating, but when I was about 48 I left all of that work. I’m not a great board member anyway, but it was an important shift for me. I was starting work on my Paul Kelly documentary and I need to throw myself into in completely.
The Shark Island Foundation set up as Good Pitch Australia and then Documentary Australia. Supporting others and films that are dealing with big issues has been incredibly important to me, but when we were managing so many impact campaigns for others, our own filmmaking would go on hold, sometimes for years. I feel like I have the right balance now, maybe as part of turning 60. I can make the films I want to make, while supporting other important social impact films, through the amazing philanthropic channels we have helped to build. There are whole funding streams that didn’t exist before that I’m really proud of.”
What does the future look like for documentary filmmakers?
“Documentaries are lucky if they break even. There has to be all the funding elements working for the film, the philanthropic funding, and the producer offset, as well as government and industry funding. If one third of the budget is raised from a sale or cinema release that is good. The investment model is broken. You can’t produce a recurring income stream if every investor is told they will lose money. It’s better to think instead about providing grants and delivering a return on social capital rather than an investment return. Successful documentaries have been able to show exactly that and demonstrate a multiplier effect.
We’ve been able to use the example of The Oasis film and homelessness in Australia. It is important to give to food and shelter, but when we saw the issue of homelessness was under- the- radar, we needed to put the face of homelessness in every household with the documentary. We provided solutions with the enquiry and the report. We had a budget of about $1 million. When the government brought in their multi billion dollar package as a result, that was a very high return on social capital for the donors.
Even so, filmmakers need to understand that they’ve got other be at it for years, often without being paid. There’s burnout in the documentary sector, and it’s just not valued enough. In awards ceremonies it can feel like the poor cousin. But these are the real storytellers in the country. These are the dedicated filmmakers.”
Do you have any cinematic heroes?
“Every film I’ve done is very different. I’m influenced and take cues from lots of different directors. For The Pool, Kon Ichikawa’s Tokyo Olympiad, a study of the 1964 Tokyo Olympics was in the back of my mind. The Final Quarter was influenced by the Brett Morgen documentary June 17th, 1994, with its narrative being built out of only archival footage. I’m deep in the edit of my next film about Kangaroo Valley in Australia, and I’m thinking about Frederick Wiseman’s films about small towns and regular communities, in places like high schools and American institutions. In the country people spend a lot of time alone and in silence, in their jobs in places like bakeries and farms, and artists there do too. This next film will have large moments of silence reflecting this, but it’s also showing how people need to socialise and come together as well, in the pub, the church, the show. It’s all looping back to community again.”
What’s next?
“I’ve spent a couple of years in Kangaroo Valley, immersing myself in the community there, so finishing this edit and seeing what happens to this new film is on the horizon.
I plan to keep going, and I hope to make a lot more films over the next couple of decades, with my new sense of balance. I feel like I’m finally coming into my stride”
