In 2018, filmmakers Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi directed the Oscar-winning Free Solo, a documentary of rock climber Alex Honnold’s attempt to climb El Capitan in Yosemite National Park alone and without a rope. Free Solo is a straightforward narrative of one man’s preparation for the biggest physical and mental challenge of his career. It’s also unsparing in showing the drive inside a person like Honnold, and what it’s like to be that person’s friend, family member or romantic partner. Free Solo respects Honnold’s discipline and skill, but it’s also not afraid to call him out as kind of a jerk. That approach is what makes Chin and Vasarhelyi a great fit to helm Nyad, the pair’s first narrative feature, which follows marathon swimming icon Diana Nyad (Annette Bening) as the 60-year-old attempts to complete a 110-mile swim from Cuba to Florida.
The swim is Nyad’s white whale, an achievement she first attempted at age 29. After years of retirement, Nyad decides it’s time to go for it again, dragging her best friend Bonnie (Jodie Foster) along as her coach. Nyad’s first attempt is unsuccessful, but she keeps coming back, spurred by her own dogged ambition and the personal demons she struggles to face down.
Adapted from Find a Way, Nyad’s book about her experience, Nyad is an inspiring tale of perseverance and refusing to give up on yourself. However, much like Free Solo, it’s also an exploration of the kind of person it takes to do what Nyad did at her age—and it’s often not a positive picture. Bening’s Diana Nyad is prickly and pretentious; her exclamation of “courage!” in French and blowing a trumpet before starting her first swim induces eye rolls with its misplaced confidence (which is kind of the point).
Nyad also takes her team for granted, assuming Bonnie and their grizzled navigator John (Rhys Ifans) will drop everything to help her with each renewed attempt. It takes several tough conversations for Nyad to realize the emotional toll her dream takes on Bonnie, who knows the many risks involved for her friend, and the personal and financial costs it incurs upon John, who’s volunteering his boat and expertise.
Chin and Vasarhelyi, and writer Julia Cox, present all this matter-of-factly. They’re not judgmental, but they are honest, something that comes through in Bening’s unglamorous performance (the actress is 65 and admirably allows herself to look every inch of it) and the lived-in feeling of her friendship with Foster’s Bonnie. The two are unfailingly real with each other. Nyad always says exactly what’s on her mind, no matter how self-important or nuts it may sound, and Bonnie responds with straight talk.
We get a preview of this dynamic early on, when Bonnie introduces Nyad to an attractive woman at a party. “Try not to talk about yourself,” she lovingly tells her friend, knowing full well that Nyad can’t help but steer the conversation that way. Lo and behold, moments later she’s holding court on her overbearing dad, who claimed that the family name (derived from a Greek mythological term for a water nymph) meant his daughter was destined to be a great swimmer, and pushed her to compete. Bonnie, who’s heard this story countless times, just shakes her head.
Of course, in addition to the character study on display, Chin and Vasarhelyi find plenty of thrills in Diana’s attempts to make her career-defining swim—risks most normal people who never consider swimming from Cuba to Florida probably wouldn’t think about. There are sharks, for one thing. Nyad refuses to swim with a cage protecting her, which means the team relies on a fascinating sonar protection system to drive the predators away.
There are also jellyfish. One sting is nasty (though not necessarily lethal), but what if there are several attacking Diana after she’s been in the water for days? The current is another consideration. Certain weather patterns could push Diana off course, making the swim more physically taxing than it already is. Again, like Free Solo, the directors revel in the process and the stunning precision it takes to accomplish a goal of this magnitude. You thought a 110-mile non-stop swim was hard? Turns out it’s even harder.
Nyad escapes the standard biopic doldrums by doing what Chin and Vasarhelyi do so well in their nonfiction. Namely, it focuses on one specific event in the subject’s life, the people involved and the process that led to it, and uses the main character’s behavior in that moment to comment on their journey, relationships and personality. This isn’t a montage-crammed epic portrait, but a detailed picture that’s genuinely curious about the person at its center, and the good and bad traits that make up their mindset. Nyad’s story of triumph is engaging and fascinating, told by filmmakers who put in the effort to ensure that what’s true of the plot is also true of Diana Nyad herself.
Director: Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi, Jimmy Chin
Writer: Julia Cox
Starring: Annette Bening, Jodie Foster, Rhys Ifans
Release Date: November 3, 2023 (Netflix)
Abby Olcese is an entertainment writer based in Kansas City. Her work has appeared at /Film, rogerebert.com, Crooked Marquee, Sojourners Magazine, and Think Christian. You can follow her adventures and pop culture obsessions at @abbyolcese.