BLACKFISH B
USA (83 mi) 2013
d: Gabriela Cowperthwaite Official
site
It’s funny how mistreatment of animals often stirs up
greater outrage than atrocities committed against human beings, where the cute
and cuddly aspect of unprotected pets abandoned by fleeing families during the
devastating aftermath of Hurricane Katrina left many in such an uproar that
they were willing to send money to save the animals, but wouldn’t lift a finger
to help the homeless and displaced humans involved. And there is no question that animals in captivity,
whether in zoos or SeaWorld, have limited space and spend much of their lives
in cages or small areas of confinement, and even animals in the wild are facing
the intrusion of human population encroaching into their dwindling territories,
so they are more and more confined to restricted space, often reduced to areas
where they are literally co-existing with humans. There’s even a short film called LOSING NEMO Losing Nemo on Vimeo (7:00), interestingly
produced by The Black Fish (The Black
Fish - A Growing Movement for the Oceans), that suggests if current fishing
practices are not altered, oceans will be depleted of nearly all fish by the
year 2048. So like any other problem of
international scope, this is more complicated than it seems, finding a balance
between corporate options and an ecological reality, as how the world looks in
the future, from global warming, nuclear power, fossil fuel emissions, rain
forests, to the growing extinction of plant and animal species, may be defined by
actions that we make today. So
ultimately it’s a question of business working in cooperation with science,
with a challenge to the world community to find ways to co-exist with other
species on the planet. With that in
mind, the film’s opening is a harrowing sequence of how an orca killer whale is
captured in Puget Sound, where a collection of boats drop bombs into the water,
clanging iron, making as much noise as possible to literally herd them like
horses and corral them into an isolated area from which they have no escape,
targeting only the babies, separating them from their mothers and families,
where we witness the mother literally crying in despair, which is a
heartbreaking moment that introduces the theme of the film, whether or not
these animals in captivity, who are then programmed to perform in front of
adoring audiences, are traumatized by the condition of their capture and their
limited, claustrophobic space at SeaWorlds that never allows them to “swim”
again, as they’re stuck in a constricted pen for the rest of their lives.
What’s also immediately apparent is the magnificent grandeur
these animals inspire, as they’re simply gorgeous creatures. And at 8,000 or 12,000 pounds, it’s simply
awe inspiring to see them fly out of the water or do flips in midair. Even in mistreatment, assuming they are,
allowing humans such close proximity to these amazing creatures can only
enhance one’s interest in their general welfare, much like seeing cuddly koala
bears or panda bears at a zoo, whose cuteness factor is off the charts, making
them among the most popular attractions.
Zoos and aquariums do serve a public interest, as children are routinely
brought on educational excursions, but the question is at what price? Killer whales have been used for popular
entertainment in water parks since the 1960’s, when it was realized they were
highly intelligent and trainable, capable of performing tricks, which combined
with their enormous size would attract literally millions of visitors. We learn Puget Sound banned SeaWorld from
collecting whales in their vicinity, so they moved to the waters off Iceland,
which is where Tilikum was captured when he was just two years old. The film follows the behavior patterns of
several whales kept in captivity, and we hear the views of many of the SeaWorld
trainers who felt it was a privilege to work with these animals. Nearly all of them claim they were young and
naïve, having little training or qualifications in the first place, so they
spewed the company line about how these animals “loved” to perform in front of
audiences, hopping into the pool with them where trainers were bareback riding
killer whales while waving to the audience, while others were jettisoned into
the air by soaring whales, performing spectacular high dives. The shows are highly entertaining spectacles,
but again the question is raised at what price?
Cowperthwaite’s tireless research reveals Tilikum, for instance, now a
12,000 pound orca, the largest in captivity, was kept in a tiny covered pool
for two years after his capture before being sold to a marine park in Canada,
which shut down their business after he drowned a trainer. He was then sold to SeaWorld, supposedly for
breeding purposes, where none of the trainers who worked there were ever told
of Tilikum’s history. Of note, Tilikum
is kept in a pen with two female orcas, a breed that is matriarchal dominated,
so they have a history of continually attacking him during the night in the close
quarters, raking his skin with their teeth, where unlike the wild, he can’t
swim away. In this manner, another
captive male in another park was literally killed in this fashion by bleeding
to death.
SeaWorld features plenty of human interaction with the
giant-sized orcas in water activities, where Cowperthwaite’s focus shifts to
the human casualties that have resulted from trainer contact with killer
whales, which often turn on their trainers and lunge at them in the water, where
an orca is seen literally flying out of the water and landing directly on the
trainer, who somehow survived this body slam, but not without broken bones and
extensive internal injuries. To date
Tilikum has killed three people, including a random stranger who illegally
broke into the enclosure and crawled into the water with a killer whale, with portions
of his body found on the whale the following morning. The most recent incident involved SeaWorld’s
most experienced trainer, Dawn Brancheau on February 24, 2010, who was drowned
after a “Dine with Shamu” show. To this
date, the official company position is “Tilikum did not attack Dawn. All evidence indicates that Tilikum became
interested in the novelty of Dawn's ponytail in his environment and, as a
result, he grabbed it and pulled her into the water." While filmed evidence of the incident shows
the whale grabbed her arm, not her hair, and plenty of earlier footage
throughout her career showed her working in the water with a ponytail without
incident, the gruesome footage was not shown, but the details reveal she was
pulled into the water where she was quite literally maimed and eaten. This catastrophe has caused the Occupational
Safety and Health Administration to take SeaWorld to court, claiming the
conditions of employment violate extreme health and safety hazards, banning
trainers from being in the water with killer whales, an order that remains
under appeal by SeaWorld, where Tilikum continues to perform every day. Perhaps the most horrifying non-fatal footage
shown is a San Diego whale named Kasatka grabbing the feet of their most
experienced trainer, Ken Peters, where the whale continually pulls him under
and holds him at the bottom of the tank, sometimes for over a minute before
surfacing, allowing Peters to grab his breath, then repeating this behavior, at
times grabbing the other foot. This went
on for fifteen minutes, where the calm demeanor of Peters, who is also an
expert scuba diver, seen practicing heavy breathing techniques at each
surfacing, literally saved his life, as eventually the whale let him go and
Peters was able to swim away to safety.
These repeated occurrences certainly point out the dangers involved with
these enormous animals, who obviously feel the effects of trauma and/or stress
from their restricted confinement.
Without making any attempt to be impartial, the filmmaker paints a very
one-sided portrait of corporate greed, where SeaWorld protects their own
interests by denying culpability and hiding these incidents from both the
public and its own employees, reminiscent of an earlier Mark Achbar and
Jennifer Abbott film THE CORPORATION (2003), which spells out in minute detail
how corporations historically elevate their own self-interests above the
interests of all others, including the public, which is how they survive in a
Darwinian dog-eat-dog capitalist culture.
While this may be an unpleasant fact of life, it is one every society must
contend with, as it remains an open question whether humans will exclusively further
their own self interests, even at other’s peril, or have the foresight to globally
co-exist.
