Blog Assignment #6

      In the documentary The Cove, the question arises whether it is ethical break the law, something that is considered unethical, to show something else that is unethical in order to do something that is right.  In this case the documentary shows the unethical treatment of dolphins and the possible extinction of them.  Richard O’Barry is an activist for the dolphins. He was the trainer of Kathy, the dolphin who played Flipper in the 1960’s TV series.  When Kathy died in captivity in the arms of Ric he realized that training a beautiful animal to perform silly tricks was ridiculous.  He became an activist and has released over twenty-five dolphins in captivity.  Ric said in the film that he feels responsible for the multi-billion dollar industry in capturing dolphins for entertainment that he helped create. He has made it his life mission to break the law and show the unethical treatment of the dolphins and ultimately fee them of this torture.

       Breaking the law is seemingly unethical. However, O’Barry was attempting to show what is unethical by being unethical. In a sense he was doing wrong to show a wrong, to do a right. In Japan dolphins are captured and the ones they don’t use for places like Sea World for performing, are cut up for their meat. Although the dolphin meat is contaminated by mercury, and most people in Japan don’t eat dolphin meat anyway.  Most Japanese citizens are not aware that some of the meat they are eating is dolphin, and most don’t know of the cruelty towards the dolphins.  This documentary has caused the Japanese citizens to be more aware of the unethical treatment and most are in agreement that it is wrong.

        Though the filming of the actual treatment of the dolphins is prohibited it did not stop Ric and activists from trying to capture and expose the truth. Though it was unethical of them to smuggle in camera equipment to film the dolphins, their purpose was a good one. They did not break the law for the sake of breaking it, the broke the law to stop a terrible thing. In most instances two wrongs do not make a right, but in this case they made two wrongs in the hopes that what they do would result someday in a right action in the prevention of dolphin cruelty.  They pursued an ethical answer through actions of unethical means. One-day dolphins may once again be a free and unharmed animal.  

The Cove. Dir. Louie Psihoyos. Perf. Richard O'Barry. Jim Clark in Association 

        with Diamond Docs and Skyfish Films, 2009. DVD.

Blog Assignment #5

 November 14, 2010  

  In 1983 Godfcey Reggio filmed Koyaanisquatsi. The title is translated as crazy life, life in turmoil, or state that calls for another way of living. The movie is an artistic expression of the destruction of the world by man. Reggio argues that man has destroyed the beauty and wonder of the earth with our machines and factories that have polluted the atmosphere.

     One of the translations for Koyaanisquatsi is state that calls for another way of living. We humans have been hard on our Earth. The pollution is great and growing, even in the 1980’s this was a problem that Reggio was addressing.  There needed to be a change in the way humans were abusing the atmosphere, and this artistic film brought awareness to this fact and it did so by using only one word.  One of the things that sets humans apart from primates is language. Though use of almost no language at all, Reggio was able to display a vivid argument for the need of change concerning the way the environment was being treated.

     The movie starts off showing a cave painting of primitive man. It proceeds to show numerous pictures of nature. One of the first pictures is of the challenger, something we don’t learn until the last scene of the film. The first time the challenger is shown, the picture does not allow the viewer to know what the image is. At the very end of the film the shot frame is widened and the rocket is revealed, then it explodes. The scene is intense, it shows that all the technologies man has can still amount to nothing. The complication of a simple thing such as nature, is something to not destroy by harmful inventions of man.

   After the nature shots it shows picture of man made factories and other such machinery that has contributed to the destruction of the Earth.  There is nothing spoken in this film. The whole film gets its argument across simply by way of showing the contrasting pictures between nature and destructive man made things. The man made images are representational of the defamiliarization we humans are having with nature in present day times. Nature has seemed to be less cared for as technology persists in its development. The film also makes a point about how nature is peaceful in its untouched state by way of music. When picture were shown that involved man the music was tense and the tempo was increased, when picture were shown of nature the music was slower and more rhythmic.