Whalefall Movie Review

“Whalefall” is a disturbingly disgusting adventure that you must take. It’s like the ride at a carnival you’re not sure you want to get on, but you just have to give it a try. ​

It stars Austin Abrams as Jay, the son of Mitt Gardiner, played by Josh Brolin. In the beginning of the movie, we see that Mitt is very sick and on his boat with his friend played by John Ortiz. He isn’t alive much longer and it’s through his passing away, the movie awakens, giving us the story of a father who wanted his son to be someone he didn’t want to be. Mitt was rough on him while he was growing up. He wanted his son to understand and be a part of nature, to love the ocean as much as he did.

Now, his fathers body is somewhere in the ocean, and Jay ends up going in alone to find him. A year later, the loss still hasn’t touched him emotionally, but being back home to see his family, he’s reminded of conversations he and his dad once had. It’s getting to Jay’s soul. When he first gets in the water, he faces beautiful fish and looks like the little plastic scuba man that sit in bottom of fish tanks. He swims around and you wonder, when is it coming?!

He sits on the edge of a deep cliff. He sees a squid. When a sperm whale comes behind the squid, Jay gets concerned. Time to go. This scene had the audience reacting with fear. I heard someone scream out, “Damn!” Yeah, so if you’re curious, it’s not that far into the movie that it gets intense and nerve-racking. Jay is getting tossed around as the whale tries to get his squid breakfast. When the squid goes in, he grabs and pulls Jay in with him, so he won’t be all alone. Not a nice guy, this squid.

There are flashbacks to Jay’s father telling him about whales and about the ocean. Jay’s reminded of the time Mitt tells him the sonar people use is hurting whales and that they’re not doing a certain job anymore, that they need to be doing for all ocean life. He goes on about the fact that one whale could feed a group of Inuit people for a year. Jay isn’t interested in this information. Jay’s moving to Iowa to go to school… nowhere near an ocean. Mitt isn’t happy about this. We go back to present day when Jay realizes where he is. He’s getting squeezed by the beast, unaware of where he is specifically. You are, too, which keeps you involved, but frustrated, as well. Jay has one hour of air in his tank and he’s surrounded by organs… sadly not those you play. Another memory comes to him, to save air, breathe like you’re sleepy.

The rest of the film is Jay attempting to escape this whale stomach. You know he’s there by a certain goo that he’s now covered with. That goo makes it more dangerous to still be inside, and then the Goliath decides to take a deep dive. These depths are not good for the human body. Jay, starting to lose his mind, has conversations with his father, as if Mitt’s a part of the whale now. Some of it is interesting, some just odd. Jay gets injuries one would expect when inside of a body. Acids and such. Will he be dying the way his father would have wanted him to? Pay attention closely. It’s told where he is and what he’s surrounded by. It’ll help if you use your imagination, just don’t frighten yourself. Mitt tells his son the definition of the word whalefall. The movie is worth seeing just to have learned that! Brolin is great delivering his lines, splendid when talking about his love for these creatures.

A note about Austin Abrams. As soon as he was cast as Jay, who spent almost the entire film inside of the giant whale, he trained with divers and earned a scuba certification so that he could do his own stunts for the film and help make it all look real. He wasn’t in the ocean a lot. For certain shots he was in a tank in Studio City, California where he was safe, but it’s nice to learn that he put in this extra effort.

The lighting is good, especially when introducing jellyfish. The sound design was out of this world. See it on the big screen for that. Your seat will vibrate, it’s so loud, especially at the beginning when it’s getting your attention. However, if you have a big screen TV at home, and a good sound system, that’ll work, too. The performances were excellent except for when, occasionally, it was hard to understand what Jay was saying. Using an inner dialogue might have been better than having him talk with his mouthpiece on. Just a thought. The movie gets a bit tedious at times. A change in location couldn’t really happen, so it leant to you getting a little restless. Flashbacks help, but not entirely.

“Whalefall” is based on the 2023 novel by Daniel Kraus which I’m now very interested in reading.