The Whore and the Whale (La puta y la ballena) is a 2004 Argentine drama film directed by Luis Puenzo. The film is about a Spanish writer who finds an old coffer with photographs of an Argentine man who fought and died in the Spanish Civil War.
Director Luis Puenzo takes viewers into a feminine universe that men rarely see. The story interweaves two parallel stories and times, present day and 1934 Patagonia. Vera (Aitana Sánchez-Gijón), a popular novelist, discovers an old coffer containing photos and personal papers belonging to an Argentine man, Emilio, who died during the Spanish Civil War. Many of the photos are of a woman, Lola, who is the person to whom many of the passionate, apologetic letters are addressed but never mailed.
As her curiosity grows about these star-crossed lovers, Vera is diagnosed with breast cancer and undergoes a mastectomy. While recovering in the hospital, by chance her elderly roommate turns out to be Matilde, one of the women in the dead soldier’s group photographs. She inspires Vera to fly to Patagonia to discover the truth.
Through flashbacks, we see the young Emilio (Leonardo Sbaraglia) as an ambitious photographer who meets and falls in love with
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