Oscars: ‘The Whale’ and Brendan Fraser Being Driven By Manufactured Buzz

Last week I received A24’s screeners package by mail. Every notable film from their 2022 slate was present, except for Darren Aronofsky’s “The Whale.”

“The Whale” has had to bank on Oscar buzz, which relied heavily on viral videos of its star, Brendan Fraser, garnering standing ovations at film festivals. The video of the one he received at Venice has close to 400k likes on Twitter.

A trailer was also — finally— released a few weeks ago, but it was mostly composed of quotes from critics with just a handful of closeups of Brendan Fraser’s face.

Now A24 has released an ad that goes back-and-forth between Fraser giving an acceptance speech mixed-in with more closeup footage of his face. It rings very hollow; there’s barely any nuance to it, just pure maudlin (much like the movie).

It’s quite obvious that the odd marketing stems from A24 being absolutely frightened by the reaction that Brendan Fraser’s “fat suit” might garner once more people finally get to watch the movie. It’s all about the inevitable “fat shaming” discourse that will occur when social media puritans watch this one. The reality of the matter is that you can only deviate attention away from the “600-pound gay man narrative” for so long.

However weird and unconventional A24’s campaigning/marketing might be for this film, you have to really give them credit: they’ve mastered the art of hiding a movie and still having people consistently talk about it. A24’s constant deflecting will finally come to an end when “The Whale” is released on December 9th.

Many are predicting Aronofsky’s film will get a Best Picture nomination, along with an inevitable Best Actor nod for Fraser. And yet, it’s not like “The Whale” is receiving rousing acclaim, reviews have been mixed. The film has been very divisive with the critics who have seen it, but the buzz has mostly continued on. Fraser is too well-loved for anybody to give a damn.

Fraser’s performance in “The Whale” is NOT worthy of any honors. The buzz is absolutely being driven by the infectious narrative behind it. Fraser’s gone through a lot, with many ups and downs, and he’s a survivor. Everyone is rooting for him because he’s a genuinely nice guy who got victimized by this toxic industry.

The “Brendan Fraser for Best Actor” narrative began way before anybody had actually seen “The Whale.” If his performance was actually a total knockout, then we’d already be saying that he’s a cinch to win the Oscar. But it’s not. There’s the real possibility that Austin Butler or Colin Farrell might win.

What “The Whale” basically amounts to is a silly self-serious weepie. It doesn’t hide its shameless attempts at tugging the heartstrings. It seems to have worked for some people, but I wasn’t buying it. It remains to be seen how Academy voters will react.