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The Loneliest Whale: The Search for 52 review – a crack team goes on a wild cetacean chase
Joy in nature and scientific geekery fuel this documentary quest for an elusive whale, whose unique song was first detected 30 years ago
The world’s loneliest whale was discovered in 1989 when his mating call was picked up by US Navy underwater surveillance designed to detect Russian submarines. The frequency of the whale’s singing, at 52Hz, was much higher than other large whales. Was this guy the first of his kind, or the last? Could other whales understand him, or was the 52 a lonesome wanderer, crossing the ocean looking for love, singing into the darkness? The story went viral in 2004 after an article in the New York Times, inspiring hashtags – #TheSaddestThingEver! – and back tattoos.
Now comes this documentary, directed by Joshua Zeman and executive produced by Leonardo DiCaprio (he’s much easier to find than the whale, frequently sighted onboard a yacht with a supermodel). Zeman charters a boat called Truth and assembles a crack team of oceanographers to solve the mystery of the 52. Spotting the whale will be harder than looking for a needle in a haystack, warns one of the experts – and this is a film raised a fair few notches by the wonder of geekery, the absolute joy of seeing scientists living and breathing their work.
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