How Production Designer Ramsey Avery Built the Creepy Whale Stomach for the Movie Whalefall

What Happened

In the new movie Whalefall, a grieving son named Jay searches for his father's remains off the coast of California. Played by Austin Abrams, Jay dives deep into the ocean where he encounters a giant squid being chased by an 80-foot, 60-ton sperm whale. When the two ocean creatures fight, Jay gets sucked into the whale's belly alongside the squid's tentacles. He is left with only an hour of oxygen to find a way out while his father's voice, played by Josh Brolin, guides him through flashbacks.

Behind the Scenes

Production designer Ramsey Avery wanted to create an intense experience by using practical whale sets instead of relying purely on computers. Avery researched real-life sperm whale autopsies with biomedical research scientist Dr. Joy Reidenberg. He also looked at cameras going into the bellies of orcas, dolphins, and porpoises to understand what animal stomachs look like when filled with fluids. Avery built a 60-foot-wide and 20-foot-deep water tank to house a 30-foot whale head with a moving tongue on an animatronic arm.

Stomach Construction

To build the main stomach set where Jay spends most of his time, Avery used two-to-three-inch upholstery foam. The interior featured multiple layers of translucent, colored silicone for a thick look, while the exterior used heavy-duty canvas coated in glue for rigidity and flexibility. The set measured about eight feet wide and six feet tall when fully expanded, but often shrank to the size of a sleeping bag. The team used four different stomachs on various rigs, including a spinning rig like a washing machine and a teeter-totter rig, to simulate the whale swimming and diving.

Visuals and Bile

The colors inside the whale matched real-life anatomy, with a white throat, a muscular white and pink chewing stomach, and a pink second stomach featuring red acids. To create the thick stomach bile, the team mixed methyl cellulose with additives to get an oatmeal-like texture. They added silicone bits to mimic floating debris and bubble ports to look like acid eating away at objects.

Context

Practical effects in filmmaking involve physical objects, animatronics, and in-camera stunts rather than digital additions made later on computers. This hands-on method helps actors react to real physical surroundings and textures on set. Weta Workshop also assisted with additional digital effects work for the film.