Brendan Fraser Brought to Tears After Standing Ovation to New Film The Whale

By Adam Barnhardt

Sunday afternoon, Darren Aronofsky and the cast of The Whale debuted the film at the Venice International Film Festival. The subsequent standing ovation for the feature, a tradition of the film festival, left the film's lead Brendan Fraser in tears. In a new video shared to social media, the festival-goers applaud Aronofsky as he hugs the cast and crew involved in the flick.

After the filmmaker speaks with some of the cast members, he introduces Fraser to the crowd, which erupts in louder applause. According to those in attendance, the standing ovation lasted for six minutes.

Fraser leads a star-studded cast, playing a character named Charlie. The movie follows Charlie, a 600-pound man, who tries to reconnect with his daughter—played by breakout Stranger Things star Sadie Sink—years after having abandoned his family. Aronofsky directed from a script by Samuel D. Hunter, who also wrote the play the feature film is based on.

"This is certainly far removed from anything I've ever done but not to be coy, I haven't seen any of it yet but I do know it's going to make a lasting impression," Fraser told Newsweek of his role last summer.

Fraser and Sink are joined in the film by Hong Chau, Samantha Morton, and Ty Simpkins.

Because of his character's weight, Fraser donned a prosthetic suit for the role.

"I developed muscles I did not know I had," Fraser told members of the media in attendance at Venice (via Variety). "I even felt a sense of vertigo at the end of the day when all the appliances were removed; it was like stepping off the dock onto a boat in Venice. That [sense of] undulating. It gave me appreciation for those whose bodies are similar. You need to be an incredibly strong person, mentally and physically, to inhabit that physical being."

He added, "The torso piece was almost like a strait jacket with sleeves that went on, airbrushed by hand, to look identical as would human skin, right down to the hand-punched hair."

Distributed by A24, The Whale is currently scheduled for release in the United States on December 9th.

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