The Whalebone Box

6/9/2024

I haven't really much idea as to what this film is trying to achieve here, to be honest. Andrew Kötting takes us, and writer Iain Sinclair, on a journey to the Isle of Harris with the eponymous box that can, apparently, alter the lives of anyone who touches it. The film makes no pretence to entertain in any sort of traditional fashion, nor does it try to engage on any intellectual or cultural level either. It appears to be little more than a self-indulgent documentary-style exercise peppered with curious whalebone stories, some beautiful cinematography from far-flung parts of the country and a disabled performer who appears to have been promised a role in a film without having that having been properly, or favourably defined.