Vindication Swim - Interview with film director Elliott Hasler
New film celebrates the life of Mercedes Gleitze and her extraordinary relationship with the waters off the Kent coast
Mercedes Gleitze really should be a household name in the UK.
A pioneering sportswoman, Mercedes became the first English female to swim the English Channel in 1927 before becoming an ambassador for Rolex and setting open-water records across the world.
The many accolades to Gleitze’s name include swimming the Strait of Gibraltar and the swim from Cape Town in South Africa to Robben Island and back in an incredible 46-hour marathon.
Almost a century on from her most famous achievement - swimming between the coasts of Kent and France - Mercedes’ feats are to be celebrated in a film.
Coinciding with International Women’s Day, the much-anticipated biopic Vindication Swim (@vindicationswimfilm) is hitting cinemas across the UK on March 8th. Written and directed by award-winning filmmaker Elliott Hasler, the film stars British-Irish actress Kirsten Callaghan in her debut role as Mercedes Gleitze, who trained for months in the Channel before filming began.
“Hopefully, with the film we can reinvigorate her memory”
The film also stars John Locke (Darkest Hour, Poor Things, The Favourite) alongside James Wilby (Maurice, Gosford Park, Howards End) and Douglas Hodge (Joker, The Great, Black Mirror) as the narrator.
“I first came to the story in 2018,” says Elliott. “I hadn’t heard of her before, which is such a shame because she did such incredible things. It was so inspiring what she did as a woman back in that age. It’s an incredible feat of endurance - even today, more people have climbed Mount Everest than have successfully swum the Channel.
“Hopefully, with the film we can reinvigorate her memory.”
The film depicts Mercedes’ upstream struggle in overcoming both the cold waters of the English Channel and the oppressive society of 1920s England. However, after a rival comes forward claiming to have accomplished the same feat, Mercedes is forced into battle to retain her record and her legacy and attempts to swim the Channel once more in vindication.
Kirsten Callaghan in her debut role as Mercedes Gleitze
“We used articles from the 1920s, written at the time,” says Elliott. “Obviously, they were very biased because, given the kind of male-dominated world at the time, they were pretty anti-Mercedes, at least initially. And then you saw this change, when they realised that she had swum the Channel and, you know, she was this incredible person.”
The film showcases Kent as the training ground for Mercedes’ historic Channel swims, capturing the essence of her training regimen and immersing audiences in the coastal charm of the county. Elliott started shooting in August 2019 but, with much of the film being shot out in the English Channel, bad weather, seasonal filming windows and Covid added months to the process.
“It was three years of constant filming, really. We were shut down three times because of Covid. And filming at sea is very challenging. You have to film when the conditions are acceptable for humans to swim in because Kirsten did all her own stunts - everything’s real. There’s no tanks, green screens or body doubles. She swam every shot, so we could only put Kirsten in the water in the summer.”
Elliott, who is now 23, first came to prominence at age 16 having created WWII: The Long Road Home, a story about his great-grandfather’s experiences as an escaped prisoner of war in Italy. The film was universally praised and premiered at the Brighton and Edinburgh festivals in 2017 despite Elliott having begun production aged just 14.
Vindication Swim becomes Elliott’s official professional debut and he plans to bring some interactive elements to the Kent and Sussex areas, with Q&As at selected cinema showings.
“Also, we share the same hometown - Mercedes was born in Brighton,” says Elliott. “We were also born exactly a century apart, which was also kind of weird. She was born in 1900 and I was born in 2000, so there was a nice sort of synergy.”
While a lot of the water scenes were shot further down the coast towards Sussex - due to the Dover-Calais shipping lanes - a number of the others used the county’s backdrops.
“We filmed one of the key sequences off the Isle of Sheppey, in which we used Kent extras and an original Thames barge. That features very prominently in the film.”
Sequences were also filmed round Tunbridge Wells, which was used as Mercedes’ hometown, but it was the filming at sea that really enticed Elliott.
“It was the challenge from a filmmaking perspective of those swimming sequences - that was something I always wanted to do and it was always how we were going to shoot it.”
Kent’s connection to the legacy of Mercedes Gleitze is also apparent in the astonishing 120-mile swim from Westminster Bridge all the way down the Thames to Folkestone.
“...even today, more people have climbed Mount Everest than have successfully swum the Channel”
But perhaps Mercedes is arguably best remembered by timepiece fanatics for her association with world-renowned watch company Rolex. A long-term brand ambassador, Mercedes wore a gold Rolex Oyster around her neck during the vindication swim. Withstanding more than 10 hours of exposure to cold waters, Mercedes went on to work with the brand during her swimming feats around the world.
This makes it even more unfathomable as to why the swimmer isn’t more well known.
“I can’t really put a finger on why,” says Elliott. “Other than the fact that she was a woman who did it back in that era. It’s just a terrible shame, really, but you know since we’ve been doing this film there’s been a huge resurgence in open-water swimming - it’s boomed and people love it. So I think there’s going to be a huge interest in Mercedes from now on and I think people are going to respond well to her legacy.”
Attention to detail was one of the key drivers in the film, with Kirsten Callaghan training in the waters around Brighton pier for months in the run-up.
“We couldn’t have made the film about Kirsten, you know, she did everything for this,” says Elliott. “She swam and she became Mercedes, she really embodied the character. I just don’t think we could have found a better Mercedes.”
Released to cinemas on International Women’s Day, and with a digital release set for June 10th, Vindication Swim is a film that celebrates the spirit and drive of a unique and special character.
“What she did really should be celebrated and put back into the public consciousness,” says Elliott. “Mercedes is undoubtedly a very, very extraordinary woman who really deserves to be celebrated on a day like that.”
INFO: vindicationswimfilm.com
