Lindsay Anderson directed The Whales of August, based on David Berry’s play of the same name, in 1987.
The film generated a lot of interest due to the casting of two legendary actresses, Bette Davis and Lillian Gish (in her final role) playing elderly sisters.
Also in the cast were Ann Sothern as one of their friends, and Vincent Price as a member of the former Russian aristocracy.
Two Philadelphia elderly widowed sisters spend their annual summer in a seaside house in Maine. They recall their relationship as young women, and the summers they had enjoyed there in the past.
In the process, they reflect on the passage of time, and the bitterness, jealousies and misunderstandings that kept them from establishing more intimate relationship.
Davis plays Liby, the more infirm and bitter of the two sisters. Sarah, played by Gish, is softer and more tolerant, intent on nursing her sister through her discomfort and trying to breach the gulf between them. However, Libby’s resentment stifles Sarah’s friendly attempts.
Meanwhile, Maranov (Price), an expatriate from Russia who has recently lost the friend, is visiting them.
Then there is Tisha (Sothern, also in her last role), a vivacious lifelong friend who provide fun and laughter, and serves as catalyst for the sisters’ revelations.
In the prologue, Margaret Ladd, Mary Steenburgen and Tisha Sterling (Sothern’s real-life daughter) play respectively Libby, Sarah, and Tisha as young women.
More than anything else, Whales of August represents a coup of casting, bringing two legendary icons, Lillian Gish and Bette Davis, to Lindsay Anderson’s delicate melodrama.
Based on the play by David Berry, who adapted it to the big screen, this 1987 movie concerns Libby Strong (Bette Davis) and Sarah Webber (Lillian Gish), widowed sisters vacationing on a Philadelphia island for their 60th consecutive summer.
Libby is blind and embittered, while Sarah is healthy, supportive, and chipper. Their neighbor Tisha (Ann Sothern) tries to convince Sarah to put Libby in the care of her daughter, but Sarah hasn’t forgotten Libby’s moral support when her own husband died.
Things change when she becomes smitten with an aging roué, a Russian emigre named Mr. Nikolai Maranov (Vincent Price). When Libby sabotages this romance, the infuriated Sarah decides that gratitude has its limits. Even so, she can’t bring herself to sell their summer house and send Libby away
In the film’s flashback sequences, Libby is played by Margaret Ladd, Sarah by Mary Steenburgen, and Tisha by Ann Sothern’s real-life daughter Tisha Sterling.
Harry Carey Jr., is also well cast as the sisters’ handyman.
Anderson’s American directorial debut features Lilian Gish in her final performance; Davis made several other movies and TV appearances.
It’s impossible to watch this movie without thinking of the long and impressive cultural and filmic baggage that each actress brings to her role.
Cast
Bette Davis as Elizabeth Mae “Libby” Logan-Strong
Lillian Gish as Sarah Louise Logan-Webber
Vincent Price as Nicholas Maranov
Ann Sothern as Letitia “Tisha” Benson-Doughty
Harry Carey, Jr. as Joshua Brackett
Frank Grimes as Mr. Beckwith
Margaret Ladd as Young Libby
Tisha Sterling as Young Tisha
Mary Steenburgen as Young Sarah
Frank Pitkin as Old Randall
Mike Bush as Young Randall
MPAA: PG
Running time: 91 minutes.
Directed by Lindsay Anderson
DVD: October 7, 2003
