Splash

Daryl Hannah as a delightful mermaid. Plus, it is a lot of fun.

I've wanted to watch this film for a while now. Really enjoyed it, good lighthearted fun.

Oh Daryl Hannah. What a role she played here.
One of my fav's as a kid!

From Ron Howard comes the magical romantic comedy _Splash_. When Allen Bauer has a chance meeting with a mysterious woman on the beach, she follows him back to New York were the two strike up an unlikely romance; but unbeknownst to him, she’s a mermaid. The casting is brilliant, and includes Tom Hanks, Daryl Hannah, Eugene Levy, and John Candy; who all give strong comedic performances. The storytelling is a little lazy, but the characters are interesting and the comedy is done very well. Full of laughs, _Splash_ is a charming film that’s entertaining and fun.

A smart screenplay and some real drama in the film save this project which could have been a disaster, but ends up being a nice piece of entertainment.

Not a perfect film by any means--Daryl Hannah's character was a pretty flat "innocent dreamgirl" archetype, for example, and a lot of the rules/lore went unexplained, but I think the MST3K rule applies here--

"If you're wondering how he eats and breathes
And other science facts
Then repeat to yourself 'It's just a show,
I should really just relax.'"

Really fun movie, would recommend.

Tom Hanks breaks out in this light, charming, modestly funny fish-out-of-water comedy (har har) about a man's lifelong encounters with a lustily enamored mermaid. It can be tremendously naive at times, and the plot is about as telegraphed as they come, but there's something intangible about this picture that manages to gloss over many of those shortcomings.

The central performance of Hanks is key, working as the plucky everyman he'd embody in most of his early repertoire, though this time it's dosed with a few fits of sharply possessive, unsettling anger. Maybe those shades just look bad in retrospect, as the film's a full generation old now, but it's tough not to cringe at such puzzling spots in the modern climate.

I think the humor falls into a similar trap, in that it was probably more relevant at the time of its release than it is today. A handful of comedies from the same era still serve as timeless examples of great humor (Ghostbusters, also released in 1984, springs to mind), and though a few of its gags and one-liners still connect, Splash isn't even in that ballpark after thirty years on the shelf.

Hanks's easy rapport with John Candy is worth celebrating, though, and Daryl Hannah is positively breathtaking as the sweet, innocent fish-tailed beauty at the center of all the action. Simple, straight entertainment that's beginning to fade as it grows older.

Misleading siren call of a splash...