It’s interesting that the word ‘rational’ is defined as “sensible, sane” or “endowed with reason,” but to put together a line of reasoning, to ‘rationalize’, means to offer an explanation that’s “plausible but wrong”. Shouldn’t taking action on something be an extension of its true meaning? The problem lies in that a “rationale” is a logical reason or basis for a line of thinking, and much of human culture applies instinct, tradition, emotion and face value mistakenly in what it feels is a logical foundation, and then things happen more often than not for the bad and for a long period of time.
Dolphin culling for the international oceanic entertainment industry takes place in Taiji, Japan. Only young female bottlenose dolphins are chosen. Because dolphins are perceived to enjoy interactions with humans, supplying dolphins for theme park life is sanctioned and extremely lucrative. It’s a very rational basis for a business.
This is The Cove in a nutshell. What are the consequences of this rationale, not just for another species, but ourselves?
Ric O’Barry, who captured and trained dolphins in the 60′s for the television series Flipper, over time and much soul searching realized that this isn’t how these creatures were meant to live. They exist in a constant state of stress in captivity. He now spends his life as an advocate for closing down this industry, but in Taiji he discovered something worse than capturing and selling a few dolphins. What he and filmmaker Louis Psihoyos, a National Geographic photographer and writer, find and how they show it to the world make for a fine film, more nuts and bolts investigative journalism than enviro-rant.
There’s been criticism of the film, of course, surprisingly from people on the same side as O’Barry saying it didn’t address animal rights across the globe, especially American attitudes towards all species that are exploited. These critics, bloggers mainly, have slipped into their own rationale that we have to be deeply concerned all the time about all things and it needs to be shown every moment.
But a filmmaker’s rationale is this: I have one story to tell. Interesting, unexpected things will happen, questions will be raised but other people will have to address them. My focus is this subject, this event and this alone is what I’m committed to. Devoid of Michael Moore‘s ham-standing, Psihoyos gets down to the business of here’s what we’ve seen, here’s what we believe and here’s how we’ll get the job done.
Throwing emotion into a rationale can skew it towards failure, usually because anger or fear is at the core of the reasoning. The Cove does have emotion as a touchstone of its rationale, but that emotion is more guilt at human hubris and folly and a need to make amends. – [DVD]
Documentary
Rated PG-13
DVD Release Date: 12/8/09
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