Brendan Fraser underwent a radical physical transformation to portray a 600-pound professor in Darren Aronofsky’s The Whale, and the film’s new trailer teases an emotional inward evolution for the Oscar-buzzed actor as well.
The latest preview for the film (below) offers a more intimate glimpse into the life of Charlie (Fraser), a reclusive, gay educator who spends his days in a small Idaho apartment, where his only social interactions are with his longtime friend and caregiver, Liz (Hong Chau).
Their relationship hits a snag, however, when Charlie’s health takes a grim turn, prompting him to attempt to reconnect with his estranged, prickly teenage daughter, Ellie (Stranger Things star Sadie Sink), whom he hasn’t seen since he left her with her mother (Samantha Morton) when she was eight years old.
“You’re an amazing person, Ellie. I couldn’t ask for a more incredible daughter,” Charlie says in the clip, though Ellie balks at his approach, which later prompts Charlie to ask, “Who would want me to be a part of their life?”
A24 Brendan Fraser in ‘The Whale’
As the trailer closes, Charlie breaks down as he declares his intentions in forging a bond with Ellie in his final act.
“I need to know that she’s going to have a decent life, where she cares about people, and she’s going to be okay,” he says through tears. “I need to know that I have done one thing right with my life.”
Though the film has received standout critical praise for Fraser’s performance — which is heavily tipped to score the actor his first-ever Oscar nomination in January — Aronofsky’s decision to cast the star as a 600-pound man has drawn criticism throughout the industry as well, with writer Roxane Gay even penning an essay for the New York Times about the film’s treatment of obesity.
“I understand why people have some of those reactions because, look, the history of portraying people suffering with obesity in cinema is not good, they are fundamentally objects of derision or jokes, or they’re completely one-dimensional. I understand when presented with this at face value, a lot of people have a reaction,” writer Samuel D. Hunter previously told EW, further calling the film an “invitation” to empathize with Charlie instead of judge him. “If you meet that invitation with a furrowed brow, then we’re kind of at an impasse. But, if you do take that invitation and go inside, I think you’ll find that this is the diametric opposite of the way obesity has traditionally been portrayed and dealt with in cinema.”
A24 Brendan Fraser makes an emotional comeback in ‘The Whale’
In a separate interview, Fraser added: “What we’ve seen with body types in films prior to this one — I looked at a lot of them. I think that those costumes, whether they were ill-intentioned or otherwise, they put quotation marks around a person who lives with obesity. And it might just be because it [was] an athletic actor inside a silhouette of a costume that was filled with cotton padding, and there’s a disconnect. That didn’t exist in the design of Charlie. He does have mobility issue, he does perspire profusely, he doesn’t look well, he doesn’t eat for pleasure, he has flaws, he’s someone who’s still, despite all of these things, somehow, eternally optimistic. He needed to make a decision about whether to just not exist or to lean into what he knew he cared about books, literature, teaching, and being an educator and drawing out truth and honesty from people as a way to their redemption.”
The Whale is now playing in limited release via A24, with nationwide expansion planned for Dec. 21. Watch the film’s new trailer above, and see EW’s full Awardist interview with Fraser above that.
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