Million Dollar Mermaid (1952) on Netflix
Stricken with polio as a child, Annette Kellerman swims to rebuild her strength. Sailing to England, she meets the promoter James Sullivan, who sees a fortune in her.
- Netflix3.8/5
- IMDb6.5/101,992 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes86%
Trailer
Plot summary
In Australia, a girl named Annette Kellerman is stricken with polio and takes up swimming to strengthen her body. Her father Frederick runs a music conservatory and accepts a teaching post in England, so the family sails for London. On board, Annette meets the American promoter James Sullivan, who is traveling with his associate Doc Cronnol and a boxing kangaroo named Sydney. In London, Jimmy proposes a swim to Greenwich, and Annette offers to stretch the distance to twenty-six miles. Word of the feat spreads. Jimmy imagines a New York water ballet at the Hippodrome for her, but the show manager Alfred Harper turns her down, so Annette goes to Boston for a heavily publicized swim in a revealing one-piece suit.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Million Dollar Mermaid (1952)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Esther Williams broke her neck while performing the film's signature high dive, having already endured seven broken eardrums from years working underwater; she felt her costume's headdress was too heavy and heard her neck pop when she hit the water.
- Louis Calhern was set to play Annette Kellerman's father before the role went to Walter Pidgeon, and Kellerman had hoped Glenn Ford would play her husband, but the part went to Victor Mature.
- Esther Williams pushed MGM to buy the rights to Annette Kellerman's life story as a vehicle for herself, and Virginia Mayo also wanted the part. Kellerman, whose 1914 film Neptune's Daughter MGM had remade with Williams in 1949, would not let her life story be filmed until she met Williams and liked her.
- During its fourth week at Radio City Music Hall in New York, the film grossed $184,000, a record for a film at a single theater.
- Esther Williams titled her 1999 autobiography Million Dollar Mermaid and has often named the film as her favorite.
