The Cove
I do want to say that we
try to do the story legally.
Sh*t.
I thought of all the possibilities
of what could happen,
and it kept me up at night.
The story that Ric
showed me at the beginning
was just the tip of the iceberg.
Here it is... the town of Taiji.
The little town
with a really big secret.
It's funny driving into Taiji.
It's kind of like The Twilight Zone.
It's so bizarre
because if you didn't know
what's going on over here,
you would think this is a town
that loved dolphins and whales.
On our left here is the infamous
Taiji Whale Museum.
And I really, really
hate this place.
When we first got to Japan,
Ric O'Barry was incredibly frustrated.
He said, "Oh, you have
to wear a mask.
Otherwise, they'll know
that we're here."
And I thought, okay, all right.
There's the police.
I've got to hunch over
and change my shape
so they think
I'm just some old Japanese guy.
I thought, you know, what am I doing?
I went halfway across the world
to end up in this car,
locked up with this paranoid guy.
Somebody's behind me.
I don't know who that is.
Yep. He's coming. He's coming.
Is he really?
Yeah. I've been doing this too long.
The mayor of this town
actually gave me the key to the city.
I was welcome then.
Today they'd kill me if they could.
And I'm not exaggerating.
catch me and kill me,
they would.
started this organization...
The Oceanic Preservation Society, OPS.
We've been diving for over 35 years,
and you could go back to the same
dive spot year after year
and literally see
the degradation of the oceans
before your very eyes.
There's major extinctions
going on right now in our lifetime.
Jim had the idea
to try to do something
about it, to stop this,
so I began documenting
reefs around the world.
I went to a marine mammal conference
down in San Diego.
There was 2,000 of the world's
and Ric O'Barry was supposed
to be the keynote speaker,
and at the last minute,
the sponsor of the program
pulled him from the ticket.
I thought, oh God, that's interesting.
Well, who's the sponsor?
They said, "Sea World."
A lot of marine mammal
scientists get their money
from Hub Research Institute,
which is the nonprofit arm of Sea World.
They don't like me.
They don't like my message
about captivity,
and they took me off the list.
They wouldn't let me
talk about this dolphin slaughter in Taiji.
I said, "Dolphin slaughter?
What's... What's that about?"
He says, "Well, I'm going next week.
You want to come?"
Now we're approaching the area
that's most important.
That's a dolphin's
Hundreds of thousands
of dolphins have died there.
You'll see the signs...
"Keep Out," "Danger."
There are fishermen walking
around these hills with knives.
This is a national park.
The fishermen told me.
They said, "If the world finds out
what goes on here,
we'll be shut down."
Can you imagine that?
They actually told us that.
We knew to get in there
and film exactly what happens.
We need to know the truth.
When we got back to the hotel...
It's a big spa hotel,
people going by in robes,
and there's these three
undercover cops talking to Ric.
No.
No.
- No.
- No?
No.
In the background,
you could see these dolphin boats
going by in the window,
and it was just... it was so surreal.
I couldn't... I wanted to laugh,
and I wanted to scream
at the same time.
No. No.
Right. I know.
Yeah.
I don't enter. No, no.
Thank you so much, and...
You're welcome.
- See you again.
- Okay. Bye-bye.
I never planned
on being an activist.
and now if there's
a dolphin in trouble
anywhere in the world,
my phone will ring.
Ric is world famous
for his work with dolphins.
The first time I connected
with him in recent years
was on a trip down to Nicaragua.
There were two dolphins
in a swimming pool filled
with their own excrement.
Ric somehow enlisted
the military forces of Nicaragua.
The dolphins were
put on a helicopter,
and then out to sea we go,
and the dolphins are released.
We're going to capture these dolphins
out of the wild
and bring them into captivity.
There are people
who will set them free.
In March of this year,
O'Barry was arrested
three times in Florida
for trying to free some captive dolphins.
On Earth Day, he was
arrested for the same thing
on the Island of Bimini.
How many times
have you been arrested?
This year?
Swimmer, you're within
a government-authorized test area.
You are holding up
a government project.
Do you understand?
God damn it.
can make a million dollars a year.
There's a lot of money in it.
If you get in their way...
and I get in their way...
it can be very, very dangerous.
Jane Tipson, she was murdered.
She's the second colleague
I've worked with that was murdered.
We were trying to stop
the traffic in Russian dolphins,
and it involved a hunger strike.
About the tenth day, I passed out,
and I went to a hospital there,
and they followed her
down the beach
and strangled her with her own belt.
These dolphins are symbolic
of a new day for the environment.
not exploitation.
I feel somewhat responsible
because it was the Flipper TV series
that created this
multi-billion-dollar industry.
It created this desire
to swim with them and kiss them
and hold them and hug them
and love them to death,
and it created all these captures.
There were five female dolphins
who collectively played
the part of Flipper.
I captured the five dolphins myself.
When the porpoise is sighted,
not a moment can be lost.
The men handle this creature
with infinite care.
She seems to sense
that she has come home,
that no harm will come to her now.
She is safe.
When I started training dolphins,
there was no manual.
I would get the script,
and it says "Flipper goes over
to the dock "and picks up the gun
and then swims down left to right."
I had to actually translate that
into action somehow.
Thanks, Flipper.
Yeah. Thanks, Flipper.
The thing that really struck me
was that they're smarter
than we think they are.
The house that you see
on the Flipper set
where the family lives
was actually my house.
for seven years.
And right in front of the house
there was a lake, salt water lake,
at the end of the dock.
When Flipper came on television
I would take my television
set from the house
and go down the end of the dock
with a long extension cord,
herself on television,
and she could tell the difference
between herself and Suzy,
who was another Flipper
dolphin that was used.
I knew then they were self-aware,
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"The Cove" Scripts.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 21 Nov. 2024. <https://www.scripts.com/script/the_cove_5993>.
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