7.5 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
A reclusive English teacher suffering from severe obesity attempts to reconnect with his estranged teenage daughter for one last chance at redemption.
Starring: Brendan Fraser, Sadie Sink, Ty Simpkins, Hong Chau, Samantha MortonDrama | 100% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.33:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English SDH, Spanish
Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Digital copy
Slipcover in original pressing
Region A (C untested)
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 2.0 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
The 95th Academy Awards are scheduled to air in just a few hours as this review is being published, and many online data aggregators more or less agree that Brendan Fraser is a near lock to win the Best Actor category for The Whale. Anyone who has ever struggled with weight (and I count myself among those ranks) might shake their head in wonderment at the thought of actors deliberately putting on pounds to essay a role, and while Fraser benefited from both CGI and prosthetics to achieve the disturbing vision of a 600 pound English teacher named Charlie, as is quite evident from candid shots of the actor taken both during production and after, he did in fact "help" things along with a bit of his own "padding", which one assumes is now going to have come off courtesy of some strict dieting. Fraser's performance, along with those of Hong Chau (also Oscar nominated for this performance) and Sadie Sink in particular, help this film to elide some at times clunky and overly theatrical writing (the project began life as a play, and playwright Samuel D. Hunter wrote the adapted screenplay).
The Whale is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films and A24 with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.33:1. According to the IMDb, Sony CineAlta cameras were utilized and the DI was finished at 4K. As can probably easily be made out in the screenshots I've uploaded to accompany this review, this is an intentionally drab and often underlit presentation that is not exactly "eye candy", but which preserves typically excellent detail levels throughout, at least when lighting conditions allow. The entire film has been graded somewhat unusually toward a kind of ochre or peach tone, and that when combined with a noticeable dusting of digital grain, can occasionally mask fine detail levels, again especially in some of the lower light situations. The film only very rarely ventures outside of Charlie's apartment, and then only for a second or two, but detail levels on things like Charlie's balding head or even some of the fabrics on his couch are precisely rendered. This is another Blu-ray from Lionsgate that exhibits noticeable banding on the studio masthead at disc boot up, but I noticed no issues with the feature itself. My score is 4.25.
Kind of interestingly, at least given the downright claustrophobic ambience of the film, the closing credits roll offer a Dolby Atmos logo, though this disc features only DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1. The surround activity is often quite subtle, but Rob Simonsen's elegiac score certainly fills the side and rear channels convincingly, and a number of ambient environmental effects, like the flutter of wings of a bird Charlie feeds from an apartment window, help to establish spatial relationships. Dialogue is rendered cleanly and clearly throughout. Optional English and Spanish subtitles are available.
This is the very paradigm of a so-called "actors' piece", and the performances in the film are its ultimate calling card. Hunter's screenplay is occasionally too mannered and at times kind of almost ridiculous, as evidenced by some of the interplay between Ellie and Thomas in particular, but even with these occasional stumbling blocks, the cast does really remarkable work. Technical merits are generally solid, though one simply needs to accept the kind of dreary visual style Aronofsky brings to the enterprise. The longer making of supplement is also very well done. With caveats noted, and for the performances in particular, The Whale comes Recommended.
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