The Whale: Movie Review

Cast: Brendan Fraser, Hong Chau, Sadie Sink, Ty Simpkins, Samantha Morton
Director: Darren Aronofsky

Adapted from the Samuel D Hunter 2012 play of the same name, Darren Aronofsky's The Whale is a complicated beast that appears to struggle at times with its message.

Central to proceedings is Fraser's Charlie, a 600 pound gay morbidly obese man who is on the cusp of dying after abusing food for an unspecified amount of time. As the movie begins, Charlie appears to be on the last week of his life, teaching an online class from behind an apparently broken webcam. 

Telling the students to be honest, and striving for them to be original, he himself is railing against his own message, desperately seeking redemption for his mistreatment of his daughter Ellie (Sadie Sink) when he was younger.

Having reconnected with her against the wishes of his carer Liz (The Menu's stand out Hong Chau), Charlie is trying to do what's right - even though the anger and disgust of his daughter is barely disguised. Bribing her with the promise of money, and the chance to rewrite her school papers, Charlie is against the clock in more ways than one.

There's an odd tone to The Whale, a film that feels almost voyeuristic in its treatment of Charlie and how the camera sees him. As the audience is both repulsed and fascinated by the character, the film veers between empathy and eliciting large swathes of disgust at his plight. 

Labouring under the fat suit is Fraser, whose plaudits for the role are richly deserved. Using some physical tics and a great deal of subtlety, Fraser's able to ensure the character of Charlie has more depth than you'd expect - and there are great elements of compassion from the actor's performance. 

But it's more a chamber piece than anything massively cinematic, with Aronofsky gradually building a sense of sadness and claustrophobia from the fact Charlie can barely move off the couch. It also helps little than the gradual reveals of why he's ended up the way he has don't quite come together to give us too much insight into the tragedy that drove this man to be what he has become.

There is a sense of a soul falling apart here, but that's largely due to Fraser's poetic and pertinent work as the story unfolds over five days - Sink's Ellie feels largely one note as she spits and snaps at her errant father, matching both the petulance of a teenager with the hurt of an abandoned child.

There is complexity at work in The Whale, but its emotional cohesiveness never quite comes together in perhaps the way you'd expect, and while the story goes exactly the way you'd expect, its catharsis is not complicated or unexpected, more a punctuation mark to a dramatic flourish than a glowing full stop.

Ultimately, The Whale rises on Fraser's work alone - paired with Chau, the two are electric, reminders of what depths human empathy and compassion can sink and rise to. Whether that's enough for The Whale remains to be seen, but expect to see Fraser's work here rightly rewarded come award time - even if the film itself falls short.