With tears in her eyes, Astrid Hackman-Roffel (45) from Assendelft sits in the foyer of Cinema Floralis in Lisse, where she watched The Whale together with other members of the Dutch Association for Overweight & Obesity (NVOO).
She’s too angry. “This is not a movie you have to go to alone.” In retrospect, she should have dragged her husband along, as a few other members did, on her own initiative. The NVOO has not indicated that guests are welcome.
Eating Disorder
Hackman, she says, has an eating disorder. “If I am not well, then I will eat. I eat away my emotions. It’s quite destructive actually.” In The Whale, the protagonist crams in all sorts of things when the emotions get too much for him. But Hackman is particularly touched by the fact that the main character does not want help for himself. “He wants to save everyone but himself.”
The main character can no longer leave the house and as a result he was able to save a good 100,000 euros. But he does not want to use his savings for treatment for the many complaints he has. He is certainly not persuaded to do so by his carer, about the only person he sees, the sister of his deceased partner. The barrel is intended for his teenage daughter with whom he tries to restore the bond. Basta. Hackman: “It seems as if he is punishing himself. Like he doesn’t deserve medical attention.” It later becomes clear that the man “wants at least one thing done right in his life.”
The English teacher teaches online. He doesn’t show himself to his students, his camera is off. “It’s broken,” he explains. When he is once confronted with a new person, such as the believing boy at the door who will often return afterwards to convert him, the question burns on his lips: “Do you find me disgusting?”
Recognizable, says the Assendelft woman. “I disapprove of myself completely. I can’t believe someone likes me. I feel like everyone is looking at you.” Hackman finds it sad when the pizza delivery boy, who delivers three pizzas a day to the main character’s closed front door, runs away in fright when he sees his customer, who never shows up. The pizza delivery boy had become curious about the occupant of the house and one day he stops to see who picks up the three pizzas on the doormat outside. “What a rejection!”
Just a human
Hackman likes the film that the sister-in-law of the main character, sweating, full of blemishes, coughing and spluttering and occasionally puking, fully accepts her as he is. She snuggles up against him, as if she doesn’t notice the huge sweat stains on his T-shirt and doesn’t mind the body odor that must no doubt hang around him. “He’s just a human being,” says Hackman.
Her tears begin to roll again. She remembers the moment when she was called ‘fat’ at the school of her sons (now 13 and 17). She found it heartbreaking to see how her son reacted to this. “He was hit by it.” She lets the giggles and snickers of young girls at her stature slide past her, she says. “I’m done with that now. But for my child, I think it’s terrible that his mother is approached in this way.”
Obesity-expert
Liesbeth Rossum.© Photo Media House
Professor Liesbeth van Rossum, obesity expert, had given a lecture prior to The Whale, together with doctor Mariëtte Boon. Van Rossum thinks that the film portrays the suffering of an overweight or obese person very well. At her obesity consultation, she sees almost every new patient in tears. On the other hand, she fears that the film will inflame the stigma. “In the film it is still ‘every pound goes through the mouth’. While there may also be other causes of overweight and obesity. Think of hormone-related issues, rare medical causes and also some medications.”
Hackman was already overweight as a child. “My mother already put me on a diet.” In addition, she suffers from some physical disorders as the cause of her obesity. If you are overweight as a child, it will be very difficult to lose it again, according to research and Van Rossum had already argued in her lecture.
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