The Whales of August 1987

Libby Strong and Sarah Logan are two elderly, widowed sisters from Philadelphia. Near the end of their lives, they spend their annual summer in a seaside house in Maine. Their surroundings cause them to recall their relationship as young women, and the summers they had enjoyed there in the past. They reflect on the passage of time, and the bitterness, jealousies and misunderstandings that slowly festered over the years and kept them from establishing a true closeness in their relationship.

Libby is the more infirm of the two, and her nature has become bitter and cold as a result. Sarah is a softer and more tolerant character, intent on nursing her sister through her discomfort and trying to breach the gulf that has grown between them. The resentment that Libby so clearly displays to her stifles Sarah’s every attempt at making a friendly overture toward her, and Sarah cautiously retreats.

Nicholas Maranov is an expatriate from Russia who comes to visit the sisters and who has recently lost the friend with whom he had been living. Tisha Doughty is a vivacious lifelong friend who provides common sense, fun and laughter and is the catalyst for some of the sisters’ conversations and revelations.

The film uses the Maine seaside setting to frame a meditation on memory, aging, and the lingering ways time can shape affection. It follows how the two sisters’ history—the summers they shared, the misunderstandings that accumulated, and the quiet bitterness that hardened between them—continues to echo in the present. As tides rise and the house creaks with the weight of years, the conversations sparked by a visiting guest and a long-time friend illuminate hidden emotions and unspoken truths. What begins as a portrait of distance slowly reveals the fragile threads of care that still connect them, even as the gulf between them remains. The narrative relies on intimate moments, restrained dialogue, and a gentle, observant pace to convey how memory can both tether people to one another and keep them apart.