Film Pick of the Week: The Whale - Review by Yvette Huddleston

He plays morbidly obese English and creative writing teacher Charlie who runs online undergraduate university courses and conceals his appearance from his students by pretending that the camera on his laptop is broken. Charlie lives in an apartment which he never leaves and has been depressed since the death of the love of his life Alan, the man he left his wife and eight-year-old daughter for nine years previously.

The only person Charlie sees on a regular basis is his friend Liz (Hong Chau), a nurse and Alan’s younger sister, a kind, straight-talking woman, who takes care of him as best she can. She warns him that he is slowly killing himself through over-eating but Charlie continues to gorge himself on takeaway pizzas, fried chicken and chocolate bars. He clearly has a death-wish. Charlie is aware that he probably doesn’t have much longer to live, but refuses to go to the hospital – this is America, it would be expensive to get treatment and he wants to save his money so that he can give it to his now 17-year-old daughter Ellie (Sadie Sink).

Before he dies Charlie is desperate to reconnect with his daughter who reluctantly comes to see him. “Why did you gain all that weight?” she asks looking at him with undisguised distaste. She is resentful that he left her and her mother and Charlie still feels guilty about the abandonment. Heart-breakingly, he offers to pay her to visit him and also agrees to rewrite her English school assignments which she has been failing.

There are a lot of complex emotions at play here and Hunter’s screenplay explores them sensitively and not without humour. Added into the mix is young missionary Thomas (Ty Simpkins) who believes that finding God will help Charlie, but Thomas is not entirely what he seems. The film’s stage origins are evident in that the action is entirely within Charlie’s dark apartment, occasionally moving outside onto the porch, although the claustrophobic quality of that is perhaps intended.

Charlie does elicit the viewer’s sympathy, which is largely down to Fraser’s thoughtful and committed performance. And there is a terrific scene-stealing cameo from the always reliably brilliant Samantha Morton as Charlie’s bitter ex-wife.