Oscar-nominated movie The Whale is about a disabled fat bloke.
See what they did there? Except they didn’t, because they shoehorn in a lot of stuff about the whale-chasing novel, Moby Dick. How sixth form! The upshot is that the whole thing is absolute ableist hogwash.
Brendan Fraser is all over the media at the moment talking about his role in a fat suit, which begs the question: why are we still using fat suits like this?
A fat suit that doesn’t move like real fat. Around an actor who doesn’t sweat or breathe like a real obese person. It’s ableist. Eye rolling. Excruciating.
Obesity is, for some, a disability. There are a ton of fat talented people out there who can’t get screentime because society is constantly told through the fact that we are invisible in media as fat or fat and disabled people (Lizzo, Robbie Coltrane and Dawn French aside), that screens are not for us.
We shouldn’t be on them.
And as long as we’re lauding an actor with good intentions who has staged a triumphant comeback, there’s no room to discuss the fact that this is… fatface.
It sounds way more clownish than yellowface, or blackface, but it’s essentially the same thing. Another barrier to a fat or fat and disabled person being given a role they are born to play.
Another role where people with mobility issues, and users of oxygen tanks, are pushed aside for a non-disabled person to play such roles.
Director Darren Aronofsky is on the record as saying: "Outside of not being able to find an actor who could pull off the emotions of the role, it just becomes a crazy chase. Like, if you can't find a 600-pound actor, is a 300-pound actor or 400-pound actor enough?"
Which is nonsense. Fat people can't act with the right emotions. I don't believe that for a second. He goes on: "From a health perspective, it's prohibitive... It's an impossible role to fill with a real person dealing with those issues."
Is it? Or is it a question of making adaptations. You know, not being ableist?
It’s the My Left Foot or Elephant Man of our generation. A film where we are supposed to admire the tragic but brave lead, ‘empathise’ with them, but really, the narrative leaves no room for anything but pity.
The whole story is a giant, mawkish, overplayed pity party for an infinifat fat bloke with poor mental health and even worse coping mechanisms (spoiler – junk food, eaten with self-loathing, until – another spoiler – he lurches towards his estranged daughter, and is lifted heavenward into the light he seeks.
Although in reality he’d collapse and crash land on her, causing her another decade of trauma. Hurrah for poetic hammy licence!
Obese people do not behave like this. We do not think or feel like this. We lead complex, rich lives. Our disabilities and challenges come with a whole host of other angles completely overlooked by this (ha!) thin little film.
In an ideal world, all the people would be able to play all the roles. But it’s not an ideal world. And where disabled people, and especially fat disabled people, can’t get roles in anywhere near the quantities representative of the number of us there are in the world, roles like this should be ours.
I say ‘like’ this, because the role is so bad and the film is so bad, that on one level I’m glad a disabled person has been spared the horror of having to defend it.
The Hollywood Reporter is quoted in the trailer as saying of Brendan Fraser: “The humanity of his performance will floor you.” But in truth, it was the banality of the performance which floored me.
I’m a fat knackered person. I’m nowhere near this dull and self-loathing. And neither are any of the other fat people I know. It’s a massively false representation of what fat disabled lives look like. It’s a missed opportunity.
I can’t remember another film in recent memory where a fat disabled person’s story has been told front and centre. But there are a lot of fat people out there. A lot of stories. Why do we need this one? Where the emotional dynamics are painted with fat child brushes by numbers. Where everyone is a stereotype.
Where the fat disabled person is a giant failure reinforcing every stereotype about fat disabled lives, what leads to fatness, and what our responses to fat disabled people should be (revulsion with a sprinkle of admiration and/or pity to make us feel better as those doing the judging).
It’s lazy storytelling, held up as do-gooding. A disappointing dud from A24 – the risk-taking production company which brought us Everything Everywhere All At Once.
If they can hold up older women – another marginalised group – with such power, grace and kickass storytelling, then they can do the same for disabled people. Maybe. Next time.
