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Why The Whale Matters
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 27 ม.ค. 2023
- Are you tired of hearing negative reviews about the 2022 film 'The Whale' starring Brendan Fraser? In this video, I break down why this thought-provoking film is often misunderstood and explain the deeper messages behind the story through the lens of its Moby Dick references. From the powerful performances by the cast to the stunning cinematography, 'The Whale' is a film not to be missed, but one that I think gets misunderstood. Don't let the naysayers fool you, watch the video and decide for yourself if 'The Whale' is really a mess of a film or if its just misinterpreted.
#TheWhale #A24 #brendanfraser
It felt incredibly real, like i was sitting in his living room watching this all play out. It also reminded me of my dad. My dad has a lot of heart problems and a alcohol addiction. It's a completely different situation, but in a way, it was like a wake-up call. I started to reconnect with him after watching this and I'm trying my best to care for him any way i can. I'm really glad that i watched this movie.
Totally not my place but I have a close family member who is also an addict and in failing health. It can be really painful to reopen that door when you’re not sure how much time they have left and hope for a better or different outcome this time. Sounds like no matter what’s happening or what happens, you’re giving him every chance and you can say you’ve done all you can.
I think that’s what Charlie’s arc is all about, doing all that you can for someone you love and finding peace in the knowledge that you did do enough to make them better, even if only in a small way. I sometimes feel like I could’ve or should’ve done more to help them, even though I know rationally that I did all I could.
Anyway, hope your dad gets better, and wishing you the best. And thanks for watching my analysis!
Glad it had a personal connection
Same here. My dad is an alcoholic too, and overweight because of that, not an eating disorder (and not as severely as Charlie). A few weeks ago he had to go to the hospital because he just collapsed for apparently no reason. He recovered after a few days but he'll have to go to another hospital soon because of heart problems. While he was at the hospital, I was having an insanely stressful week at work, I worked 16h a day to meet deadlines. So I just texted him to see if he was okay and he said yeah. One evening at midnight when I had just finished working, his girlfriend called, drunk, crying and shouting at me why I wouldn't even visit him at the hospital, and then just hung up.
I'm so conflicted about this because he didn't visit me when I was at a psychiatric clinic when I was 19 and tried to kill myself during a drug induced psychosis. He also didn't take care of me when I was 15 and my mum had a stroke, I was living alone for a few months while she went to rehab even though she begged him to come live at our place until she's back. A few years earlier, after my parents separated and I was shortly living with him to finish the school year, he fucking drove me to school drunk with close to 3 permille - we almost had an accident, thankfully we were stopped by police soon enough and he only lost his license for a year.
He has been such a shit dad to me, honestly... even though he's not really a bad guy at heart, not even an aggressive drunk, just a sad one. After I moved to my mum, we've had less and less contact until we were pretty estranged. TBH I've always dreaded when another year or two had passed, meaning it really was time that I visit him again. Not just because he'll always be drunk when I visit but mainly because I don't know what to say to him. I've tried talking it out once, he just listened to what I said, cried and... said nothing. Nothing at all. I can't truly reconnect, but I can't completely cut ties either. It's horrible. And now that his health problems are getting worse, I feel more and more confused and overwhelmed about what's to come.
So yeah, this movie hit very close to home. It's not a cinematic masterpiece, there are a few Aronofsky movies that are objectively better. But no other movie has gently forced me to reflect on my relationship to my dad like this one did.
Sorry for the trauma dump...
@Nirax Nah no worries about it, it's just venting and from the sounds of it, a long overdue vent not a trama dump. Glad you were able to vent, and im really sorry you had to go through that. I wish you the best. For some its good to reconnect with certain family members while their struggling in some way cause they might be feeling alone, but you being there for them shows them that they have someone and that you do care about their well being. For me, it was a bit hard at first cause my dad gets really aggressive with alcohol. But I waited for him to process that he needed to get help so we could take him to AA willingly, i didnt want to force him as hard as that was. I also go and buy him stuff that he needs and since I'm his daughter i can pick up all his meds. I take him to the doctor when he needs to go. Now I'm so happy that I did and if i could travel back in time, I'd do it all over again. Just take everything one small step at a time.
The most beautiful and touching stories often speak to many of us in different ways. You don't have to be literally represented to be able to feel any of that, or put yourself in a character's position.
I hope you and your dad can enjoy some happy days together.
To me, The Whale represented the physical body of Charlie while the captain Charlie's mind. Charlie is self destructive in his guilt and thinks killing himself will let him be "happy" much like the captain thinks killing the Whale will give him happiness. When the essay reads how it's sad to see the captain's misbelief, and how it reminded her of her life, Charlie is confronted with the same. After that, we see him continuously battle between more self destructive tendencies or starting over.
Incredible! I noticed that too, but every analysis I've seen hasn't mentioned (what I saw as) the true significance of the essay. It seemed under-explored that it's surface relevance as "a good honest piece of writing that his cherished lost daughter wrote years ago" was somewhat trivializing the emotional crescendo of the last act. It was his acknowledgement that, having only received the document several years before, he recognized it as being a profound and almost omnipotent vision of his own future she described only through intuition. That trauma would make people (Charlie) both a victim and a killer. If you watch the scene when he gets up, all the passages of her recitation corresponded to a recognition of his exterior appearance, juxtaposed against the tortured soul beneath. The uprising camera shot as he stands while she states "poor, big animal", for instance. There is also potential to deconstruct the homoerotic relationship between Ishmael and Queequeg. But at the end, when she realizes that they have truly seen each other, they both become overwhelmed at the moment of Charlie's death.
Not to Darren, try again
@@mynameismice I literally started my comment with "to me". 💀
Raj, that is a great analysis!!!!
I think captain is his daughter and charlie whale
anybody else feel like the theme of "honesty" is looked over? I know the majority of the viewers sympathize with Charlie. But when the exwife said "everything is about you". I felt that that was an honest external opinion of him and his dynamic with the people around him. He ran away with his lover without considering the consequences with his daughter and his family. After his lover passed away, he punished himself and thus erased his lover's tragic death (by keeping that about his lover) with his own plight and self-loathing. He had enough money to get himself the tools to help himself and mend the relationships that he cares about the entire time. Yet the truth is, he never did until it's too late. Even still, he wants to be the savior and convinces himself that if he can repair/repay his relationship with his daughter then he can go in peace. He even said "I just want to know I did one thing right". It was never really about the daughter. He was drowning in his own self pity. He also took advantage of his caretaker this whole time by putting her in a munchhausen-type of situation, so that he can keep on receiving pity and attention. AITA for seeing that part of the subtext?
I think you nailed it. Charlie must have also lied about his homosexuality when he married the wife. He explains it as "a strange period in his life" or something. There is also something weird going on with Liz. Her brother almost starved himself to death during his last weeks. And she is constantly feeding Charlie as if shes trying to compensate for that, but also killing Charlie in the process. Then there is Thomas the young preacher, who is trying to "help" Charlie, but in reality he is only trying to absolve himself from his own feeling of guilt for stealing from his church. It´s really weird but I feel like the message is something like: the desire to "help" and to be seen as "good" is sometimes based on egoistical motives, without people themselves realizing (also represented by the local church-cult). This the worst kind of dishonesty. I think the only honest character in this was the ex-wife. The daughter even more so, but to an extreme.
@@grnzrn oh yes that’s a great point about liz and charlie are definitely codependent. they romanticize this dynamic yet refuses to be honest about the reality of their unhealthy coping mechanisms.
whether charlie lied about his sexuality deliberately or under the pressure of religion, it sounded to me (from the ex wife and daughter) that he could’ve handled the situation a lot better than he did. i also remember the part he slightly mentioned that he was a teacher and Alan was a student/TA. definitely a questionable relationship considering the conflict of interest. everything is about him, the ex wife really drove home the theme for me.
he consumes so much emotionally out of the people around him. i suspect he did this to himself partly because of self loathing, but also he knows that creating an extremely pitiful situation for himself is the only viable chance for his daughter to notice him. i speculate that he is aware had he ran away and been happy with his new love, his ex wife and daughter would’ve just moved on and forget about him.
Shane Herr
You are the ONLY person I have encountered on the entire internet that truly understood his character! Excellent! Good for you! I am so sick of all of the pity and sympathy wasted on him.
80% of these people haven't even see the movie and most of them are cheering for Fraser to win an Oscar because of his PR orchestrated sob story, not this melodramatic, poor me tripe.
@@grnzrn Great to someone else who gets it! He's a Covert Narcissist. The worst kind.
@@ifyouonlyknew811 I definitely agree that the character of Charlie was a kind of an awful person. (The majority of the characters, actually...) I was so fundamentally disgusted by his consistently wrong choices that it was actually kind of difficult for me to sympathize with him by the end. He was a disgusting human being, yes, but it was entirely due to how he was as a person - not remotely due to his weight. I kind of disagree about Fraser, though - his acting in this movie really was fantastic; he totally disappeared into the role!
I cried and laughed several times throughout the film. I was ugly crying when I left and I felt emotional several days after. I don’t think a film has ever done that to me. To be able to tell such a powerful story with such little change in character and scenery speaks volumes. I still have so many questions and revelations even weeks after I’ve seen it. It deserved more than that 6 minute standing ovation. The casting was just so absolutley perfect. No wonder it took 10 years before it made it to screen.
Considering Brendan left his own wife and child(ren) for that Mummy 3 male crew member (and then discarded him), he was ready to play this part in 2007. He just had to balloon and make up his phony comeback sob story and hire the PR firm to promote it.
@@ifyouonlyknew811 I don’t really care about actors personal life unless it’s toxic to society (racist, sexist, etc) I stand by what I said about how I felt about the film. It doesn’t change the writing, the directing, and the performance…or how I felt about it. You’ll be sad to hear most actors are regular people who fuck up probably more than the common man. But yeah- you’re TH-cam commentating makes you morally superior.
@@mamamua4644 No, the way I live my life does. Brendan is toxic. He has been since childhood, and he just keeps getting worse.
@@ifyouonlyknew811 okay
@@mamamua4644 Never mind this troll. This person's nuts & has made the same delusional comments about this actor on other WHALE reviews. As a fan of Director Darren Aronofsky I'll say: you don 't get a film this powerful often---they're rare!
As you also pointed out, the whale in Moby Dick is not really important, it is just an object of obsession, much like Charlie's weight is not really the focus of the movie despite the fact that his obese body is flashed in front of our eyes. I think this movie is aimed at changing the viewers' perspective on Charlie, from object of constant ridicule and repugnance, to a fellow person who has feelings like the rest of us and who has one last unselfish dream.
What is his unselfish dream?
@@danielgomez8776 he has given up treating his illness to leave money to his daughter hoping to ensure her future.
It seems that critics are usually very harsh regarding "emotional manipulation" movies. They see them as a gimmick or cheap trick. The Whale is not that. Yes it is a highly emotionally charged film, but it is not only meant to make you cry. It is a very deep, meaningful, and thought provoking film and Brendan Fraser deserves all the praise he's been receiving and then some. That is one of the best performances, I've ever seen. Fraser became charley and made every line and movement seem authentic.
I think any movie that manages to intentionally make a lot of people cry is successful. It's a movie! Let it manipulate you!
Some things that stood out to me on first watch:
It's sort of a bottle episode, it never really leaves his home.
It was always raining and foggy. And with his home being compared to the ship, that kind of makes sense.
He had no control when it came to food, but his discipline about the money was a sort of strict diet instead.
It felt like he was trying to get from his students the same thing he got from Ellie's essay.
To me this felt like one of those "dying hallucination" stories, where he actually died at the beginning with that heart pain, and he gave himself some kind of reconciliation and penance, if not redemption, regarding his wife and his daughter. And with Ellie finally reading the essay, he went into the light. It felt like that's what the ending was anyway, but then it occurred to me it could extend all the way to the start of the film.
I think many people have chose to prejudge based on unfounded assumptions. If they had taken the time to let go of certain biases, they would see that it's more than the sum of its parts, and that the title has a different significance and meaning, not some cruel descriptor. The Whale, in my opinion, is one of Aronofsky's best work in years yet again catapulting Brenden Fraser and Hong Chao, deservingly so, into Oscar contention.
This Play is about Ellie, we need to inspire the kids, even if we failed ourself.
He kept is as a play, is that the best way to tell this story?
Can he make a movie too please ?
my man speaking the one and only language that is facts.
to me the captain is the daughter , who thinks that just letting her father , who is the 'whale', behind and 'killing' her emotions will bring hetrjoy eventually or that shell forget, but writting this essay she realised that thats just not gonna help her.
The Whale is a story about addiction, a selfish man, a codependent relationship, grief, estranged relationships, difficult teenagers, all sorts of things. It's also about how people treat fat people, disabled people, the way you are judged based on your physical ability often by those closest to you. I love the movie and Brendan really shined as Charlie.
The reason why Charlie's so obsessed with Ellie's essay isn't only its honesty, but also the fact that it's pretty much a parable of their own lives. Just like captain Ahab, Ellie's obsessed by The Whale, an emotionless animal represented by Charlie (even though Charlie does feel many emotions, his condition throughout the movie resurfaces every time he expresses a strong emotion, like laughter for example, sending him into an uncontrollable coughing fit and forcing him to curb his own feelings) wanting to kill it (that is, erase her father from her memory?) so he could live peacefully.
Charlie doesn't just favour honesty in literature for the sake of it, he does it because he knows that's the key to putting down our whole souls on paper, or, as is the case with this film, draw parallelisms with an already existing book to acknowledge some aspects of our own persona.
Yes. That moment as the daughter is about to leave then stops at the doorway when you realize you had it all wrong and that the story and writing were genius. I happens so quickly, ease to miss. Good analysis.
I felt that the Acaab figure in the movie is the doughter, emotionally amputated by the father and wanting revenge, but then connecting to what she already knew, that killing the whale will change nothing, and that he's just a poor whale after all. So she reconnect to that knowledge and heal
Agreed
"To find truth and meaning in connection with others". Wow. This here is one of the best lines one could ever find from a movie critic, or whoever, by that matter. There's still hope.
Wow this means a lot, thank you
This spot on. Im so glad someone understands this and is sharing it!
damn you need to do longer video essays. I was disappointed that the video was only 6 minutes long!! Great stuff :D
I really like your analysis, and I agree with what you say, for the most part. This movie definitely left me thinking, that’s for sure. It was so complicated, as life can be, and it dealt with issues of a man being closeted, the results he has when he finally falls in love with a man and his finally forced to face his truth, the consequences, and the role religion would have in his partner’s mental health, the loss of his child, and that guilt, his relationship with food, his addiction, and his caregiver. So, so much to unpack here, as well as the analogy to Moby Dick. This is definitely a movie I’ll watch more than once, and I thought Brendan Fraser was perfect as Charlie.
Just stumbled across your channel and wanted to say great work you got here! I definitely feel like this is a movie that suffers from its surface details being misconstrued as the overall message.
Keep up the good work, you got something special. ✊🏾
Seeing the film advertised and seeing the title I instantly thought it was a film on a fat guy by the image and the title I watched it expecting that but got so much more than what I was expecting it was a very touching but emotional movie
I find the film beautiful not because of the ending, but because of its message. Throughout whole film we discover that so much disaster could have been avoided if these characters would be honest to each other. The mother not telling about daughters problems, the daughters being emotionally unavailable to everyone. Larry being dishonest for full 8 years of marriage that he was gay.
It really made me think. I've also had mental problems, and if I would just be sincere about them with my parents and myself, this could have been avoided. Be sincsere, people. It's one of the most beatiful things that we can do
The way I also read the title and the meaning of it within the story is how a whale is typically seen as a lone creature within a huge ocean, kind of like Charlie at the beginning of the movie. Or actually, every character, in how they're ultimately alone with themselves, and their experiences and who they've become. But what we've discovered studying whales, is how deeply social they are. They live as a family, they function as a family, they communicate through miles and miles. They travel, every year, to the same spots. They are familiar to each other and eventually ALWAYS come back to each others. They are deeply bonded to each other within a community/family, and that's also very true ultimately when it comes to the characters. Charlie and his daughter, through blood and love, Charlie and Liz through shared trauma and experience - which created a bond of love, but also some kind of co-dependency. Charlie and Thomas, through faith and what it means to either of them. The movie is all about human connection, how ultimately it's the ruling force of every decision we make. Every decision everyone makes. Ellie isn't mean to Charlie just to be mean to Charlie, she's mean to Charlie because of their connection and how she's been hurt because of that connection and how he failed her. Charlie doesn't reach for Ellie just for himself, but ultimately also does it for her, to allow her to see herself how he sees her. These human emotions and human visions feed the characters with each others, that's how they survive, and that's how a whale survives in a big, huge, black ocean as well.
"Somewhat cruel" if you knew a fraction of what overweight people go through in public scenarios you'd defo reevaluate that. The Whale was amazingly fair, and a brilliant film
Ay really great video man keep it up
He’s trying to tell his daughter how perfect she is and how great people are. If he actually thought that why did he let himself die? Why did he only try with his daughter when it was too late? How am I supposed to believe the positivity of a man so depressed he ate himself to death?!
Right????
As someone whose daddy was like Charlie, who died of a stroke because of the excessive weight.
It was real to the core, it made me sob because it was like I was looking at my dad.
Down to the feeding a wild animal by his window part.
It was real, it was cruel in its reality. Because that's what it is, the life of morbidly obese person.
Brennan Fraser did an amazing job with Charlie and his big heart was important to the character.
sorry for your dad, hope your doing great
This video was perfect, it was short but got straight to the point! Thank you!
The essay says the author of the book writes about the whale to distract from his own sad situation, so I think apart from the play on words to do with his size, the essay acts as an allegory for charlie turning himself into the whale to distract himself in the same way... I don't think the intention was to actually kill himself by overeating
Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
I was a bit overwhelmed by the emotions the film gave me. Your perspective helped out pretty good. Thanks for that!
Nice video. Aronofsky doesn't make the meaning behind his movies too obscure, complex or hard to figure out, but he does like to layer up different elements that express his key theme. Also, most of his films really come down to the theme of obsession when you think about it.
Great video as usual!
Out of every youtube video of interpretations of the film. This has been the best. No one even touches on Moby Dick and all say its a film just about addiction and fat phobia. People are idiots. Now they want to just cancel the director and Brandon Frazier. Oronosky or however you spell his name is to good of a writer to make this so simple and would never just make a film about fat phobia.
Scott Travis
I bet if the 2 of them misspelled your name, you'd have a hissy fit. Aronofsky didn't write the script. Neither did Brendan Fraser. The Gay play right did.
"No one even touches on Moby Dick" I'm going to be watching a few other reviews, and if they don't address Moby Dick that will be astounding. It was a fundamental part of the storyline in so many ways.
That review at the beginning blew my mind. I had no idea there was any way to misconstrue or misinterpret the film as it is really obvious. Apparently not I guess.
I think The Whale was such a precise and nuanced depiction of selfishness. The use of obesity as the manifestation of greed was honestly a very clever choice. Everything he does is selfish from his incessant “I’m sorry”s to his refusal to go to the hospital. What I think this film does so well is reveal how in real life, selfish people take in a way that uses our human instinct to care for others against us.
You made me realise something there. Some self destructive people will apologise or say "I'm sorry" but with a double meaning that amounts to "please don't be mad at me so I can continue doing this"
Thank you for making this video. I was getting frustrated at so many people dismissing this film and not taking the time to look at any deeper meaning.
i think its about how we let pain and addiction destroy us, when we should just appreciate what we still have, before we are gone.
dude i cant too many people saying dum shi like " i hated how claustrophobic it was why didn't we see anything more than his living room" bruh you gain 500lbs and try to leave your 2nd story apartment it places you in his small home and locks you in, just like he is
this movie felt like a wake up call for me
But what about the end of her essay?? What was she going to say? Did she write that essay after Charlie left them?
Nice review, what about cinematic references and the way of storytelling- I need some analysis asap
Great opener. Great explanation. Another one of my favorites is how everyone assumes the film is fat phobic, but the entire point is for you to empathize and connect with the fattest person on screen.
Agreed. It’s one of those films that I think challenges your idea of what you think you’re seeing. As that critic said, it comes off as a sort of fat phobic “voyeuristic” critique of a morbidly obese person, highlighting the sounds and the image and making it all look and feel “disgusting.” But that’s surface level inherent bias coming out. I think the film and Brendan’s Fraser especially do a great job of endearing you to the character and demonstrating that he’s carrying the weight of his guilt and eats away his anger and his frustration so he can put out positivity. Like there’s only one scene in the movie where Charlie ever gets angry with anyone, and his condition grows worse because he chooses to save all his money for his daughter rather than to see a doctor or get healthy.
Like I said in the video, “the Whale” isn’t a fat phobic statement about Charlie’s weight. If someone is watching this movie going “wow they really just called this giant man a whale in the title,” it shows that they aren’t paying attention to the movie or the many things it’s telling us.
It has nothing even to do with Charlie. The whale is a reference to his daughter, like the great white whale Moby Dick, it represents the one thing in his life that gives him purpose and that he needs to confront before he dies at all costs.
Nobody's going to mention that in the essay they call Ahab a "pirate?" What's that all about?? Did none of the writers actually read the book?
I think at the end when he was on the couch his heart stopped, and the rest of the positive fantasy was his dying thoughts.
what microphone do you use?
Great review
I absolutely loved this movie. It is so emotional but not depressing. It is hopeful.
And I agree with you about the true theme of the movie. It has been called "that movie about that fat guy"..... which is just not what the movie is at all.
It really hit a chord in me
The best part was the "Beep Beep Beep" by Liz
I love your channel! Can you do the Hulu show The Bear?
Hi, thank you for this video. I think that there another layer to thus movie. Do you know the book Ishmael, by Daniel quin
I kinda think that we can also do this the other way around and think of Ellie as Ahab in some ways and I think this is also brilliant
This movie puts questions in my head, the one my heart and my soul know, and my flesh will answer it slowly
I would absolutey love your analysis of "enter the void" 2009 its a difficult film to watch but tells a story, unlike anything I've seen, and in a way I've never seen. Also major photosensitive warning. the reason I ask is it gets an A LOT of hate during the last 2/3s where there is very very little dialog, which I find is judged with a bias that people just got bored.
Your notion that “The Whale” is actually a metaphor for Ellie is brilliant! Great analysis
I read that Times review too and wondered if we saw the same movie.
I’ve witnessed morbid obesity first hand in people I love, and the depiction here is SPOT ON. It depicts it with honesty (one of the film’s themes that is lost on most). It’s ugly. It’s debilitating. It can ruin your life. And only you can do something about it. The daughter is in many ways despicable, but she’s angry in a way only someone who has loved a food addict can understand.
In the end, all he asks is for honesty. It shocked the pizza delivery guy (gotta wonder about him … I’ve delivered pizzas before too, and you see a lot more shocking things than a morbidly obese man). It shocked his class. Disclosing that the evangelist had stolen money was cruel, but it was honest. And being honest with everyone and himself was his salvation. As cruel as his daughter could be, at least she was honest. And in the end, that honesty allowed redemption.
The FA criticisms of this movie? All nonsense. The main character is depicted as someone who is easy to love and suffering with a food addiction he can’t control. He’s morbidly obese to the point of being reclusive and non-ambulatory. Like it or not … that is the ugly truth of what it is like to be morbidly obese. It’s not fun, nothing to be proud of, and causes all manner of grief to the obese person and the ones that love them. That’s the honest truth.
If it matters so much, nobody has to be reminded that it does. Hence it doesn't matter
This was the best review of the movie I’ve seen so far
Amazing video
Best film I’ve seen in a long time. Brendan is back!
hard hitting writing with metaphors on metaphors... it's about purgatory at it's roots.
I also got the message of passing the obvious. And about that I had two interpretations. 1) the miserable lives of all the characters besides Charli. 2) A representation of American society, where Charli is greedy but preaches to be a good person, while helped by a foreigner, and a disfunctional relationship with his future (daughter).
Had a "disagreement" with a commenter on here who called the film "G@y propaganda" & the more I think about it the more their argument made sense.
One till this day has to think about the unseen choices life has put us tru. One can get twisted with hatred but it really isn’t us. The nature.
I think the movie depicts the personal hell, Charlie has created for himself by internalizing the hatred of the church (and broader christian society), which he has been faced with his entire life due to him being gay. This internalized hatred is worsened when he loses his boyfriend to the church and is not allowed to go to the funeral and mourn. We follow him as he self-hates himself to death. The ending is tragic because he, in death, accepts the church's idea of good, that being him in a straight singular family.
I'm glad to hear other people who at least understand the Moby Dick reference in it's totality. Not that a literary parallel is needed to make the movie interesting. I think people understand the weight as the whale, and Charlie is Ahab.
I appreciate your analysis.
But "infinite buzz" rules.
Just watched it. Amazing movie.
the fact that people are actually mad at it, because they didn't cast a actual 600 poud obese person is just sad.
I mean Charlie is about to die because of his health disorder, why can't people just see it.
amazing movie
Is it possible for the whale to be Alan?
If you think about it, Alan was Charlie's true obsession. Charlie's journey to get Alan represents adventure, love and total freedom. Charlie sacrificed everything to be with Alan and defied all logic.
Alan's death eventually triggered Charlie's dependence on food and his regret of not being in touch with his daughter.
Maybe we watched the aftermath of Moby Dick and the consequences of obsessive behaviour. In that case, obsessive behaviour was the relentless pursuit of adventure and love instead of superficial food addiction.
Some might think the movie criticised "obsession behaviour", but I would argue that it was a celebration of defiance. Discover your truth, owning your dreams and their consequences. The quote "people are amazing" was used to highlight that fact.
great movie
I watched the whale at the time i was reading the metamorphosis..and God oh God...
Charlie's daughter is a monster. F-bombs galore! The film was short in almost total darkness, which I found to be annoying. An actor uses his body/face to emote and we could barely see it! In our opinion, Mr. Fraser's talent deserved a better film. We were glad that he won the Oscar!
A.O Scott is such a clown 😂
I have never touched Moby Dick. The movie or the book. I've just caught a bunch of facts of the story through Osmosis and the Creative commons.
If the worst thing that can be said about AO Scott's reviews is that they expose the man's weakness for bad puns, that already puts him in the top 10% of film critics to me.
And to be fair, even though Ellie in the movie was a horrible human being, she was the only person who had the sack to call out Herman Melville on his bs. Those parts of the book where he just listed whale facts _were_ boring as shit. But I guess they didn't have the internet or youtube back then, so maybe all they could do for fun was try to impress each other with how many whale facts they knew.
yeeaahhh, I think maybe you outta tap the brakes a bit on your cartoonishly asinine criticism of a novel that is, in most "greatest novels of all time" lists, unfailingly listed near the very top. Cuz, you know, it makes you look like a moron.
If he died when the movie implied, he would have fallen forward onto his daughter, smothering, and likely suffocating her. It’s also the exact same ending as aaronofski’s better film, the wrestler. It’s the same takeaway, living your dream, even for a moment, or a moment longer, is worth dying for. The whale had good acting, but was a boring, bad movie.
Actually I think he died before like, when he got up that was already part of the fantasy
Moby-Dick is about Ahab? I disagree.
It's interesting how the simplest of literary ploys--inter-textual reference to modern texts, pathetic fallacy--seem to think they can somehow warrant or upstage the fact that this narrative is 100% predicated on entirely bigoted cliches. The entire story, its framing, and the story of its production (Fraser, a height-weight-privileged person undergoing a "radical transformation") all come at the expense of fat folks. This is not to say that the actors and craftspeople behind this production don't have a lot of virtuosic skill on evident display. But one of the most notable things the film seems to represent is the degree to which fat and disability respect in 2023 is lagging unacceptably behind other forms of social progress and understanding.
i hate critics
This is all obvious when watching the movie
2:20 No shit Sherlock, he was the whale being killed off. Why do you think the last thing he heard was a review for Moby Dick?
sadie sink is so fine... omg
I thought it was dull, pathetic, and surface. There was no depth, no emotions and every character seemed to be written from every known stereotype. Charlie is a self-centred narcissist. By the way, I never read Moby Dick and have no interest in it.
😎🙏💯
Is this even a review
It’s a video essay.
I feel like the whale is his pursuit of meaningful human relationship. I'm almost certain Fraser's character could have given a hollow f*** about Ellie, if his boyfriend didn't die or leave him.
Ellie is his last shot at 'participating' in a meaningful relationship. So he emotionally blackmails Ellie into participating in his suicide fantasy without ceding one iota of healthy parenting to his tortured daughter.
In the end, he fantasizes about a death where he reconciles with his daughter. The warm light that fills the room when Ellie opens the door to leave, serves as a clear departure from reality. The reality that the healthiest thing any of the movie's characters could have done, would have been to cut ties with him completely, giving him a wide berth to self-destuct, minimizing collateral damage.
The movie was beautiful. It was like watching a gunshot wound blooming into florets of ruined flesh. Hard to watch, but beautiful.
The only real problem with the film is Sadie Sink.
Her character?
That guy was right. The movie sucked
This movie was horrible!!
No it's awesome.
Moby Dick, the 'I only have one book' theory, Obsesion.
Obesitas can be anything that keeps you home depressed.
The movie is about Ellie, we need to inspire the kids, even if we failed ourself.
Hi, thank you for this video. I think that there another layer to thus movie. Do you know the book Ishmael, by Daniel quin