Fraser could make a big comeback, debuting with his transformative role in Darren Aronofsky’s film, which had its world premiere at the festival Sunday night
Fraser could make a big comeback, debuting with his transformative role in Darren Aronofsky’s film, which had its world premiere at the festival Sunday night
Brendan Fraser is having a moment at the Venice International Film Festival.
The once ubiquitous movie star of the “The Mummy” franchise and “George of the Jungle” had, over the past decade, shied away from the spotlight. But Fraser is charting what could be a major comeback with his transformative role in Darren Aronofsky’s “The Whale,” which had its world premiere at the festival Sunday night.
As the credits arrived at the Sala Grande Theatre, audiences lined the film for a long time while Fraser wiped tears on the balcony with his director and co-stars.
Fraser plays Charlie, a kind-hearted English teacher who weighs 600 pounds (270 kg). While the film already has pundits predicting Oscar nominations, Fraser is trying not to wonder whether the awards are in his future.
“I’m just trying to stay in today,” Fraser said before the premiere.
Aronofsky has been trying to make “The Whale” for almost 10 years. He clearly remembers reading The New York Times review of Samuel D. Hunter’s play, going out to see it, and knowing he had to meet the author.
One line in particular clung to him: “People are incapable of not caring.” So, he said, he had to make the film.
But the casting presented a challenge.
Aronofsky said, “To the pain of Sam Hunter, it took me 10 years to make this film and that’s because it took me 10 years to cast.” “Casting Charlie was a huge challenge. I accepted everyone. Every single movie star on the planet. But none of it really clicked. … it didn’t move me. It didn’t feel right.”
Then, a few years ago, he saw a trailer for “a low-budget Brazilian movie” with Fraser and “a lightbulb went off,” he said.
Fraser, who has a role opposite Leonardo DiCaprio in Martin Scorsese’s next film, “Killers of the Flower Moon”, said he “didn’t know an actor in my peer group who’s worth his weight in salt who’s going to die.” Wouldn’t want to work. Darren.”
PLUS: “By far and wide I think Charlie is the most heroic person ever,” Fraser said. “His superpower is to see the good in others and bring out the good in them.”
Prosthetics were used to transform Fraser into Charlie, who rarely leaves his couch.
“I had to learn to move in a whole new way. I developed muscles. I didn’t know I had. I even felt dizzy at the end of the day when all the equipment was removed, as you can see in the one in Venice.” Will feel like getting off the boat,” Fraser said. “It gave me an appreciation for people with similar bodies. … I learned that to be in that body you need to be an incredibly strong person, physically, mentally.”
Beyond his physicality, Charlie is also a character who has deep empathy and love for everyone around him, including his estranged daughter, Allie, played by “Stranger Things” star Sadie Sink.
“She has a lot to say so she comes hot. But I guess what she’s not expecting is someone who cares for her a lot,” Sink said. “For someone like Charlie it’s To see there’s good in someone like Ellie, it’s throwing her for a loop.”
Hunter, who also wrote the screenplay, said his play is personal. He started it 12 years ago when he was teaching a compulsory expository writing course at Rutgers University that no one wanted to take and everyone opposed it. He also pulled from his background, setting the play in his hometown of Moscow, Idaho, and weaving in his history of being depressed, self-medicating with food and attending a radically religious high school as a gay teen.
“I was afraid to write it,” he said. “I thought I could only do it if I wrote it from the depths of love and sympathy. … I wanted (Charlie) to be a lighthouse in the middle of a dark, dark sea.
“The Whale” was Aronofsky’s favorite type of challenge—with many of its limitations. He learned long ago in 1998’s “Pie” that boundaries are “your gateway to freedom.” He only had $20,000 and a dream in that movie. “Mother!” I was confined to one house. And, in “The Whale,” it’s not just an apartment, it’s also a character who doesn’t move much.
He and cinematographer Matthew Libatik, whose friendship extends to his days at the American Film Institute in 1990, spent much time talking about “how to turn theater into cinema” and “how to make it engaging and exciting”. . In Rough Cut, Aronofsky said he was relieved to know it didn’t feel claustrophobic.
Fraser said that the film is “a piece of cinema. Proper cinema.”
Venice is a regular stop for Aronofsky, who won the Golden Lion in 2008 for “The Wrestler” and also debuted “Black Swan” and “The Fountain” on the Lido. He said that the festival is like home.
Aronofsky and his actors may be ready to carry trophies in hand this year as well. “The Whale” is part of the festival’s official competition, which will be decided on September 10 by a jury led by Julianne Moore. And A24 plans to release it in theaters on December 9. But she’s mostly happy with 2017’s “Mother!” Come back with your first film since.
“Over the years, a lot of us have lost a lot. … Cinema is about human connectedness. It’s a chance to slip into someone else’s shoes and have two hours of empathy on someone else’s mind. I think that’s exactly what the world needs. I’m very happy to be back,” Aronofsky said. “It’s a big moment for me and, I think, for cinema.”