Directed by Louie Psihoyos
Written by Mark Monroe
Rating - Golden Gun
I’m not going to talk politics much on this site. But, I’ll admit that when I hear the phrase “save the whales/dolphins”, I roll my eyes. “Environmentalist”…”Tree-hugger”…”Going green”…these are phrases that I tend to shrug off and not give attention to. But when I saw the trailer for The Cove, a documentary by Louie Psihoyos, I was intrigued. I saw the movie and left shaken.
Taiji, Japan hides a very dark secret. It is such a guarded secret that most of the residents there are unaware of what goes on in the shallow waters of that hollowed-out rock formation. For years, fishermen there have gone out to sea in roughly 13 boats and embark on what is essentially a herding operation that can last for days. Because of a dolphin’s super-sensitivity to sound - hence their use of sonar - the fishermen attach steel pipes to the sides of their ships and bang them mercilessly. It literally drives the dolphins crazy. Between the aural assault and the prolonged journey, the dolphins are exhausted by the time they reach this secret cove. Representatives of dolphin exhibition companies (ie, SeaWorld - although the film points out that SeaWorld no longer acquires their dolphins this way) pick out the dolphins they want to train. After they have paid for and procured the show-dolphins, the massacre begins. Dolphins are speared repeatedly and their throats are cut. The sea turns red with blood as the dolphins thrash about and scream. It is an intense and disturbing sound. During these fishing periods (lasting up to 6 months), up to 2,000 dolphins are killed.
Why the hell would anyone do this? The first obvious answer seems to be “Well, it’s cultural”. Bullshit. The documentary points out that while Japan is heavily involved in the whaling industry and that whale meat is a delicacy, dolphin meat is not considered a delicacy. In fact, dolphins are revered by most citizens even in Taiji. The disturbing truth is that the dolphin meat is packaged and sold as “whale meat” and is being consumed in mass quantities by the population. Even more disturbing is the fact that the dolphin meat is highly contaminated with mercury thanks to massive, unchecked, and unregulated factory pollution. The result is alarming rates of birth defects in Japan, especially Minamata disease which aggressively attacks the neurological system causing severe deformities as well as limitations or loss of limb movement, sight, hearing, and speech.
The government is also to blame. Outrageously, this contaminated meat went into school lunches in Japan for years (it was finally stopped recently). Government officials are also responsible for spreading disinformation in telling the people that dolphins are pests and this fishing practice is necessary for “pest control”. They believe that whales and dolphins eat too much fish. Gee…maybe that’s because IT’S A WHALE? Funny how we insert ourselves into an ecological system and try to make it better. Always with disastrous results.
And this is just the tip of the iceberg of problems that Louie Psihoyos and Ric O’Barry are pulling back the curtain on. Ric O’Barry is a hell of a guy. He was the dolphin trainer on the TV show Flipper. It was through this job that he began to realize a serious disconnect between the way that humans interact with dolphins. In fact, he believes that Dorothy, one of the dolphins he trained, committed suicide in his arms. Ric says that when you spend enough time with dolphins, you can read their body language and you can tell when they are depressed. Dolphins are not meant to live in captivity. One day, Dorothy swam into his arms, stared at him, took one final breath (significant since they are voluntary breathers), and sank below the surface. He was accused of her death and even arrested for trying to help her escape. He never tried to free her but he vowed from that day on that he would free as many as he could.
Whenver he makes one of his many trips to Taiji, Ric is followed and sometimes even questioned by the local police. He and his crew believe they are also followed by the Yakuza (Japanese mafia) who have heavily vested interests in this fishing practice that Ric wants to end. At the cove itself, they are confronted by hostile fisherman who try to provoke them into a physical confrontation, so that the police can arrest Ric (which has happened many times). The problem is that no one has ever been able to film the slaughter because of the security.
Enter Louie Psihoyos and his team of scuba divers, activists, and thrill-seekers. They received assistance from Industrial Light and Magic in designing high-definition cameras to be hidden in fake rocks that blended with the landscape (some of them underwater) and trees around the cove. The problem was how to plant them. These operations account for the films most thrilling and nail-biting sequences as they evade foot patrols to plant the cameras. The film ends with a few minutes of the footage that they captured. It is shocking and will leave an indelible impression on you.
As yo up probably know, dolphins are highly intelligent creatures. They are trained through sign language yet do not possess hands. They - like whales - communicate through a variety of sounds using nasal airsacs located below the blowhole. They are pranksters. They have been observed sneaking up behind pelicans and snatching their tail feathers. And they have an uncanny relationship with humans. One surfer in the documentary tells a riveting story of a dolphin saving him from a shark attack. Someone in the film posits that maybe we should turn our focus away from the search for intelligent life on other planets when we have dolphins. These are special creatures.
How we treat animals says a lot about us as a person. The book of Genesis tells us that we have dominion over the animals. They can be used as a food source but we are also to respect them. Whether or not you believe in the Bible, I think most people can agree that what goes on in Taiji is abhorrent. There is a scene in The Cove in which a scuba diver swims with a whale. It is amazing to see two creatures of such varying sizes swimming together in grace and harmony. There is a bond of trust there. It is absolutely breath-taking.
Some will scoff at the film and brush it off as animal-rights propaganda. Well, propaganda is not inherently evil. The word itself has been given a bad name from despots and sadistic government officials who use it to oppress their own people. But by definition, propaganda can be used to help people or organizations. I am not an animal rights activist by any stretch of the imagination. I’m not an activist of any kind really. I’m not a vegetarian. But, I know the difference between right and wrong.
The Cove is in limited release but is probably showing somewhere in your city. See the release date schedule.
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