Jake Gyllenhaal: Natural born swimmer - and Brother Jake is 'sweet'?

The American swimmer Michael Phelps has had a little bit of success lately, winning more gold medals in China than most countries. Not surprisingly, expectation of a biopic is high and a site today listed Jake Gyllenhaal as one of its five choices for the role - here is an actor who could realistically play an Olympian.


So, aside from the fact that Jake has definitely got the muscles to swim further and with more power and speed than many types of fish, here are some of the reasons why Jake is a natural swimmer.



1. Jake's swimming stamina was made clear on the Jonathan Ross Show last October - how many other stars would swim across the Atlantic (there and back in one long weekend) to make amends for their carbon footprint? Not many, I hear you say.

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2. Jake has had experience of being a fish - an orange fish no less.



3. Jake looks bloody good in blue swimming shorts.


4. Jake's youthful ambitions for the water were expressed at an early age by a) nicking speedoes (a desperate act) and b) wrestling jellyfish off MV tourists.


5. Training for Jarhead involved, each day, anything from 20 minutes in the pool to an hour - this differs according to the interview and has been mocked by witness Peter Sarsgaard.


6. Jake can model a towel like no-one else - it does help if it's stripey.



7. In The Day After Tomorrow, Jake received training on how to deal with a deluge in a busy New York City street.



8. If you're going to spend time in a pool, you'll also want to spend time by it, and that means a taste for cocktails is essential.


One review of Brothers - Jake 'sweet'?

Jeffrey Wells at Hollywood Elsewhere last night included a review by someone who claimed to have seen Brothers. It's so spoilery on one aspect that it led to cursing, so if you don't want to know anything about the relationship between the three leads, don't go there. If you do, here's the link. However, their opinion is this, bearing in mind that the viewer also found the original a 'bit weak': 'Jake and Portman were sweet; Sam Shepard adds a small but interesting motivation that I don't remember from the other version; Tobey is the revelation.' One adjective that has never even occurred to me when describing Jake's acting is 'sweet'. Roll on the time when we can see it, and Brother Jake, for ourselves.


Includes pictures from IHJ.