Finally saw “The Cove”

Earlier in the year, I had gotten pretty excited about seeing The Cove, a documentary about dolphins and some crazy killing of dolphins that goes on in a naturally secluded cove in Taiji, Japan. I read a few articles about it, including a good piece in New York Magazine, but things never aligned and I ended up missing it. I finally watched a screener of it late last week, and it’s fantastic.

Shot and told well, it covers a lot of ground historically and has plenty of drama and intrigue - wide-spread international shady cover-ups, local Japanese opposition sabotaging any attempts to reveal what’s happening, vintage 60s footage from Flipper and beyond, clandestine night missions involving military-grade recording equipment, thermal night-vision devices and even special camera enclosures designed by Industrial Light and Magic.

Yes, it’s disturbing in parts - there are dolphins getting herded and those not sold to “Dolphinariums” and water parks around the world are ultimately slain without mercy - but for me, the truly disturbing parts discuss how the heavily mercury-laden meat from the slain dolphins mysteriously finds its way into the Japanese fish markets and public consumption chain in Japan, being given to school lunch programs, despite how no one in Japan seems to eat dolphin. In reality, it turns out not many Japanese know they might be eating dolphin - the meat is illegally being sold as expensive whale meat and few know how much mercury is actually present. All in a country that knows the dangers more intimately than any other, with regard to the severe mercury poisoning to generations of Japanese that occurred in Minimata.

All in all, a great doc, and it’s out on DVD this Tuesday, December 8th. So put that on your Netflix queue or whatever you do. Plus, Hackers actor Fisher Stevens is a producer on it. Hack the planet!