Who wouldn’t like to be beside this seaside? Noi and his dad share a cosy home with colourful bunting, sands on the doorstep and views of a stripy lighthouse. The Storm Whale, an adaptation of the 2013 picture book by Benji Davies and its sequel, opens with a romantic ode to the briny air. These gulls swoop majestically, rather than cause a nuisance.
Lydia Denno’s designs are idyllic but Davies’s story foregrounds how forlorn Noi (Emily Essery) feels while his dad (Richard Lounds) is away fishing each day. When a little whale is washed up, Noi gratefully befriends the animal before accepting he must set it free. Director Matt Aston’s adaptation, for children aged four to eight, sensitively explores how solitude need not mean loneliness. It’s a lesson passed on to Noi by the mother he has lost, as Aston sketches in a fuller backstory for the family.
