WilsonFilmAnnotation9

The Cove, Louie Psihoyos, 2009.
 * 1. Title, director and release year?**

The central argument of the film was to question Japan’s dolphin hunting culture. The film is a call to action to halt mass dolphin kills, change Japanese fishing practices, and to inform and educate the public about the risks, and increasing hazard, of mercury poisoning from dolphin meat. It is narrated from an ocean conservationist's point of view.
 * 2. What is the central argument or narrative of the film?**

The narrative is made through former dolphin trainer Ric O’Barry’s quest to document the dolphin hunting operations in Japan, specifically in Taiji, Wakayama. The movie takes viewers to the exact location where the dolphin drive hunting and slaughter is occurring. The film states that the dolphin hunt is mostly motivated by the tremendous revenue generated for the town by selling captured dolphins to aquariums and marine parks. Dolphins that aren’t chosen for captivity are slaughtered for their meat, which is unhealthy for human consumption due to their high mercury content. The film also states that most Japanese are unaware of the hunt due to censorship within the country. Scientific information is provided in the form of interviews with the proclaimed subject experts (like activist Paul Watson), town officials, council members (about their policies), and those in related to the work of the International Whaling Commission. In this way facts and actual occurrences is what is presented rather than scientific information, except in regards to the subject of mercury levels. The film has emotional appeal by the means of shocking footage.
 * 3. How is the argument or narrative made and sustained? How much scientific information is provided, for example? Does the film have emotional appeal?**

The sustainability problems that the film draws out are legal, ecological, cultural, and organizational. This is a legal issue in that in Japan, these hunts are legal. This movie questions if they should be. It’s an ecological problem due to the threats the dolphin poses to humans and the ocean with their toxic mercury poisoning. It’s a cultural issue because whale and dolphin hunting have been a part of Japanese tradition for years (the dolphin meat part, not the selling them to marine parks). Organizationally, the film talks about how the Whaling Committees don’t protect dolphins since they don’t group the cetaceans with bigger whales.
 * 4. What sustainability problems does the film draw out?**
 * Political? Legal? Economic? Technological? Media and Informational? Organizational? Educational? Behavioral? Cultural? Ecological?**

The most persuasive parts of the film for me was when the dolphin was trying to escape and went for the activists but died from blood loss instead. Also when the entire lagoon turned blood red and you could hear a lot of high pitched squeaking due to the dolphins freaking out. What I found especially interesting was when the fishermen were offered monetary compensation to not kill the dolphins – but they turned it down as the Japanese government has convinced them that dolphins were “pests” and had to be eradicated anyway, or they would eat all the fish. Other parts of the film that I found compelling were the inclusion of Lucasfilm’s Industrial Light and Magic Team – personally, because I am a huge fan of their work. I also personally met and know someone who was briefly in the film as an activist, so it was very exciting to see them in the film.
 * 5. What parts of the film did you find most persuasive and compelling? Why?**

A little morbid, but: why didn’t the fisherman bring the dolphins elsewhere to be killed? When sharks are killed for their fins, they are brought up onto boats first, then their fins are sliced off, then they are pushed back overboard. Wouldn’t collecting the dolphin bodies from the water be inefficient and more noticeable? Did the fisherman have some reason for doing it this way? Were the interactions with the Japanese fishermen and locals staged and framed in such a way that it seemed as if the fishermen attacked them randomly out in the open (did the filmmakers do anything to entice this reaction on the spot)? Could Cathy’s, the Flipper dolphin, death really be considered a suicide? Maybe she was actually just dying.
 * 6. What parts of the film were you not compelled or convinced by? Why?**

This is actually a difficult question to answer because the people who need to see this the most are the citizens and residents of Japan, but they might have a strong cultural stigma to ignore it, and the film is not in Japanese but in English. So I suppose that makes the real audience of the film Westerners, who might then pressure people who have influence on Japanese decision and policy-makers to do something about the problem. Since it is also just trying to spread general awareness, The Cove’s audience members may just be the general ocean-loving public who want to know more about what is happening around the world.
 * 7. What audiences does the film best address? Why?**

It would be more educational to the perceived target market audience if the film was in Japanese or written in such a way that would convince them to change their cultural values instead of just writing them (the people who should see the film the most) off as barbarians.
 * 8. What could have been added to this film to enhance its environmental educational value?**

The focus of the Social Action Campaign for //The Cove // is to create worldwide awareness of the annual practice of dolphin captivity and slaughter as well as the dangers of eating seafood contaminated with mercury, and to pressure those in power to put an end to the slaughter. The corrective actions the film specifically suggests include signing a petition, writing to leaders, keeping updated on the issue, know your own mercury exposure, boycott dolphin shows, and telling zoos and aquariums to aid in stopping the dolphin killing.
 * 9. What kinds of action and points of intervention are suggested by the film? If the film itself does not suggest corrective action, describe actions that you can imagine being effective.**

SeaWorld claims that the majority of their dolphins have been bred in captivity and that they do not get their dolphins from Taiji. The Internet claims differently, so I read articles from both sides. I’m still not quite sure who is correct (both sides claim the other is a liar), but it was an interesting and inconclusive read. I also read an article about a Japanese toxicology scientist that was interviewed by the filmmaker and is now suing the people involved in the film. The article reads:
 * 10. What additional information has this film compelled you to seek out? (Provide at least two supporting references.)**

[The scientist saw //The Cove // last year at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan — one of the first screenings of the film in Japan, where it has been greeted with protests and skepticism. "I am asking the editor to cut my appearance, because it turned out to be very different from a scientific film, I never signed off on the use of my footage, so I want the director to apologize for using it without my permission," Endo said.]

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