This documentary may be one of the most powerful I have ever seen.
It was first shown at Sundance in January 2013, then was picked up by Magnolia Pictures for wider distribution. The director, Gabriella Cowperthwaite, was inspired to do this film after the tragic death of SeaWorld trainer Dawn Brancheau in 2010, who was killed by Tilikum, a 12,000 pound Orca whale, the largest in captivity. SeaWorld blamed Brancheau – she slipped, she didn’t follow rules, she wore a ponytail that distracted the whale, she… well, you get the idea.
When Cowperthwaiste discovered that the whale had killed several other people at various water theme parks, it changed her vision of the movie. And her vision is simple. In the wild, there isn’t a single instance of a killer whale having killed a human; it’s captivity that turns them into killers. Orcas- and by extension all wild animals – shouldnot be kept in captivity and they certainly shouldn’t be kept for entertainment by a corporation like SeaWorld that makes billions on these whale performances/shows.
The documentary traces Tilikum’s long and arduous journey from his capture on November 9, 1983, when he was just three and taken away from his mother; to a brief stint at Sealand in British Columbia; to his final home at SeaWorld, where he arrived on January 9, 1992. The director not only provides footage of his initial capture, but interviews an elderly seaman who was involved in the capture. His testimony is heartbreaking. In fact, there are so many heartbreaking scenes in the movie that you walk out of the theater in stunned shock that these theme parks still exist.
During Tilikum’s life in captivity, he has been bullied by other whales, deprived of food when he didn’t do what a trainer wanted him to do, kept in a completely dark, 20-foot-long pod at night, and basically lives in what amounts to a large swimming pool. Some of the most damning evidence about how Tilikum is treated comes from the ex-SeaWorld trainers who are interviewed in the film. Listening to these people, it’s clear that Tilikum has endured things that any of us would qualify as torture.
SeaWorld’s official line is that in the wild, orcas live only for 25-35 years and live longer in captivity. But Cowperthwaite interviews animals experts and neuroscientists who contend that orcas in the wild live as long as humans and have distinct family structures. Mother and children are so closely bonded that even when a whale reaches adulthood, it doesn’t leave its mother’s side. In one particularly wrenching scene, a mother whale mourns for days and nights after her calf is taken from her. That sound hadn’t been heard in the thirty years she had been in captivity. As one ex-trainer noted, When you hear that sound, you know that what has been done is morally wrong.
SeaWorld, who declined to be interviewed for the film, is now in full throttle damage control. A week before the film opened, they hired a Manhattan PR firm, 42West , to help them discredit the film. After all, Tilikum is their zillion dollar baby; his sperm has sired a number of whales for the theme park.
SeaWorld is apparently running so scared it has hired Eugene Scalia, the son of supreme court justice Anthony Scalia, to represent them in the next round of appeals against the Occupational Safety and Health Administration – OSHA. From whales.org: “After the “willful” violation that OSHA cited them for in 2010 (after Brancheau’s death) SeaWorld appealed, first to an administrative law court, and then to a Labor Department commission, finally to the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which ordered the company to enter mediation with OSHA to establish a guideline for interactions between killer whales and trainers. This latest appeal will again be heard before the U.S Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.”
Rob and I talked about the spiritual side of this whole thing, that perhaps on some deep level these wild animals agree to captivity for some reason. As one neuroscientist points out in the film, the part of the brain that governs emotions is highly developed in Orcas, suggesting the capacity for profound emotional connections. Does that make them more like us? Or does it suggest an intelligence that far supersedes that of man?
In one riveting and revolting scene, Tilikum is milked of semen by his human handlers; this scene bears eerie parallels to the descriptions by abductees who have endured medical experiments in which aliens harvested their sperm and ovum.
Here’s the trailer. This movie is worth 83-minutes of your time. I hope it wins an Oscar and becomes the game changer it should be.
Regarding Darren’s comments about his cat and the mouse, the killer whales eating the dolphins, etc., I agree with him completely. Something we humans tend to
forget, or WANT to forget or at least ignore, is that there is a natural food chain on this planet. As humans, we can control that chain which involves us as individuals and even as groups. But we cannot control the natural instincts of wild or even domestic animals in their food chain. Snakes eat mice and rats, as do cats. Large birds of prey eat rabbits, squirrels, whatever. Big fish eat little fish. It’s something we sensitive humans hate to comprehend, but it IS the way our world of creatures has been created. As human beings, we can only do what we are able to make a difference in the insanity of humans against humans and humans against animals. But we can’t alter the natural instincts of animals, such as a lion in Africa charging and eating a gazelle. It’s very sad and cruel….the way of the world of Nature….yet it has its magnificent aspects, as well. We must focus as m,uch as possible on those.
General Wesley Clark on the wars –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=9RC1Mepk_Sw
Something to think about maybe ?
I’ll take a look!
OK, I just watched it. All about oil. 7 countries in five years, planned as far back at 2001. It’s staggering, but not surprising.
I think the trouble with films such as these is they don’t get the wide audience they deserve because people either don’t want to,or can’t handle the truth of the dark-side of nature.There was another great film like this about dolphins from Seaworld which was hailed just as much as this film.It was called “The Cove” –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4KRD8e20fBo
Made by the original Flipper’s trainer (you think if anyone knew about the workings of places like Seaworld then you couldn’t get a better insider than this guy).
But people don’t want to see and hear about the the real world and how bad it just might be,so they ignore films like this in case…God forbid…it might make them sad.
Man is probably the cruelest of all of God’s creatures roaming the earth,but if anyone bothered to watch my links in my first comment posted here,it’s clear that Killer Whales have a dark streak too.They eat dolphins for breakfast,so how loving are they when it comes to being intelligent creatures ?
My cat I loved dearly and he was intelligent too,but I remember catching him playing with a mouse,biting it,pawing it,terrorizing it basically,just for fun.I was appalled when I saw him doing this and hit him with the soft end of a broom to let him know what I thought of his behavior.Most times he was a good cat (the times the I was around him) but he had that dark streak of nature that we carry within us ALL.
We have to look at both sides of nature to see the full picture,not just the good bits that they throw on at the end of a news bulletin before they read out the weather forecast for tomorrow.
This is why we hear of people walking past dying people in the street,because people don’t want to involve themselves in the bad parts of life,the person might actually die in front of their eyes while they are trying to save them.Best to just leave it to the next person to take care of it they reason.And this is why people don’t watch films like this one,because it might just be too morbid to think about and ruin their entire day.
Jack Nicholson’s words from the movie “A Few Good Men” always ring in my ears when I see reactions to movies like these and why people can’t bring themselves to watch them.
“Truth ? You want the truth?You can’t handle the truth! “.
Sorry for ranting,but I hate to see filmakers put in such hard work to bring to a public’s attention,who just won’t even try to watch a film like this,in case it makes them feel sad.
We saw The Cove. It was difficult to watch but it was a powerful documentary that won an oscar nomination, with good reason. Documentary films like these – and like Michael Moore’s Farenheit 9-11 and Bowling for Columbine – expose that dark side and hopefully prompt us to change how we think about something, change what we believe.
Exactly what I’m trying to express above in my comment.
The truth can be hard sometimes,but unless we take a look we may never know it is there waiting for people like us to get involved to change what we can and accept what we can’t.
Yes, I agree totally.
This chemical warfare business is simply too heinous to accept. The videos on all the national news channels of those hundreds of dying and dead children…..and adults…and their suffering….I think HUMANS are the worst animals on this planet!! Obama’s attitude concerns me. I don’t want to see another Viet Nam, or Desert Storm, etc. We’ve already lost too much and too many, and what good would a military strike from us do. It would just result in retaliation and more deaths.
Chemical warfare….biological warfare….doesn’t get ,much worse than that, except a nuclear bomb. Is that what is coming next????
The TV pundits keep mentioning that we have to do something or the U.S. will lose its credibility. What does that even MEAN? Why are we the world cop?
I don’t think I could watch this film, although I greatly appreciate your post about it. As the news informs me that our brave leaders are poised to engage us in yet another war, and as I cannot help but imagine all those children and old people under a rain of drone bombs targeted by people far away, to whom they are nothing but statistics……..I reflect that this story is also about a world that has become without empathy, let alone respect for life, all kinds of mutually evolving, beautiful, and terrible, life.
Is there really any difference between the paradigm behind this story, the utterly cruel and inhumane treatment of chickens or pigs that are now factory farmed, and the people to whom dropping bombs is no more real than some kind of war video game? Forgive me, but sometimes I feel very discouraged.
I doubt if there’s much difference at all, Lauren. I was pleased to learn that the UK parliament voted against intervention.
I’ve been to an equivalent of Sea World in Europe many years ago, never again. Humiliation of wonderful creatures. They are interested in profit not the whales, dolphins and other animals.
I remember we went to sea world in san diego when megan was very young and I got to sick to my stomach we had to leave.
Much too painful to watch or think about this. I can’t even watch a movie when a lion kills a zebra in its own habitat for survival needs. Unbearable news here. People are barbaric. No that’s not the right word. What is? Then there is all this news about people killing each other with gases and poisons. I have to turn the television off these days.
p.s. I am not sounding coherent here and should delete – just pissed.
Memory, it seems, is short. We invaded Iraq on faulty intel. The U.N. should handle this.
I have never taken my children to a Sea World. It just seemed wrong. And after finding out the whales died from the constant sounds of the roller coasters at one of the parks near San Francisco, I knew I made the right decision. It is inhumane and must stop. It starts by educating the public. Thank you for this post.
This documentary really says it all, Nancy.
There’s a beautiful and touching story in “Anne’s Diary” today at the Strieber’s UnknownCountry site, about the dignified death of a special cat. I had a peculiar situation with my canine companion last week. Storm IS shy when she first meets people, but she will quickly warm up to a person and wants to be petted. (Typical Lab) But when my in-laws came to visit, both of whom are animal lovers, but both of whom are also quite ill with differnt debilitating ailments, Storm wouldn’t go near either of them. She wasn’t hostile. She simply stayed by my side and even when I gave them dog treats to offer her, she refused to go to them. I knew she was sensing their illnesses, but I didn’t tell them that. I just said “she’s shy”. But animals KNOW when a human is ailing, and sometimes it seems they avoid that person. Storm certainly does.
I read that entry. It really is beautiful, math.
Keeping such animals in captivity for display and profit is tantamount to raising pit bull dogs for purposes of dog-fighting and gambling, and cock-fights. Although the whales and dolphins, etc, and not raised and taught to fight, the context is similar. They are confined and deprived of their natural instincts, and it is horrific abuse. Elephants are also extremely intelligent and close to their families. The sounds a mother elephant makes when her child is killed or dies is soul-wrenching. Sometimes when an elephant dies, its mate dies soon afterward. These animals are nor dumb creatures without feelings, thoughts, emotions. I tend to have a sense, sometimes, that they are more highly evolved than humans.
They don’t call them Killer Whales for nothing.
Seaworld may want to make sure they keep them well away from their dolphins.-)
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2377154/Eight-ton-orca-leaps-15ft-air-finally-capture-dolphin-hour-chase.html
I wouldn’t swim with these creatures any more than I would swim with a shark.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_YN5GnW94o
It can be a cruel world out there.