The Whale is not a masterpiece – it’s a joyless, harmful fantasy of fat squalor

 

 "I have been writing about being fat, begging for my humanity to be seen, for a long time. I might tell you, with reservations, that we’ve made some progress in my time. Smaller fat people have a few more clothing options. Weight Watchers has rebranded to pretend it isn’t a diet programme. High-fashion designers will sometimes send a token fat model down the runway, even if they don’t sell garments in her size, while mid-market brands feature a slightly more realistic range of models. It is now trendy, on Instagram, to suck the fat out of your waist and tummy and spray it inside of your butt and thighs to make them a little fatter (although I hear heroin chic is also coming back – as if it ever left). I personally was allowed to make three seasons of a television show in which a fat woman leaves the house and has many friends and lovers and is not particularly depressed. That’s something, isn’t it?

The structural oppression of fat people (substandard medical care, lower salaries, exclusion from public life) remains unchanged but, hey, at least it’s fashionable to have a huge ass now, and the thin people are a little nicer to our faces. But how do they talk about us when we’re not around? The Whale, I fear, holds the answer."

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The Whale is not a masterpiece – it’s a joyless, harmful fantasy of fat squalor | Film criticism | The Guardian: