The Cove
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The Cove is a 2009 documentary which won the 2010 Academy Award for Best Documentary. It documents the practices of the small town of Taiji, Japan, a Real-Life Town with a Dark Secret. Every year, fishermen in Taiji drive thousands of dolphins into a small secretive cove, where they are slaughtered. The documentary revolves around a small crew of American and Canadian filmakers who try to find ways to plant cameras to document these horrible killings. It was followed up by a new series headed by Ric O'Berry, Blood Dolphins.
Tropes used in The Cove include:
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- The Atoner: Ric O'Berry, who went from being a celebrated dolphin trainer to an uncompromising activist to free dolphins from aquariums, as well as to expose the Taiji dolphin kill.
- Bittersweet Ending: The whale hunts are still going on, but more people are aware and Taiji is no longer serving dolphin meat. As the ending captions note, people can still protest about whales and do the right thing.
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: the International Whaling Commission members from small Carribean countries who appear to have traded their votes for financial support from Japan.
- Obstructive Bureaucrat: Much of Taiji's council, which apparently has an intentionally complicated bureaucracy system to make it hard for outsiders to get any footage of the Taiji dolphin kill.
- Properly Paranoid: Ric O'Berry, who director Louie Psihoyas thinks is a bit of a kook when he talks about being constantly observed in Taiji and how the fishermen would probably kill him if they could get away with it. Then Louie starts to notice he's being followed around town by mysterious cars...
- Sadistic Choice: To get evidence of the dolphin killings, the crew has to let the dolphins get slaughtered while they videotape it. Some Greenpeace activists in the early 2000s refused to do this, cutting the nets to free the dolphins.
- Token Good Teammate: Two council members in Taiji alert the crew about the campaign to spread dolphin meat through schools nationwide. One cites that he has two sons and doesn't want them exposed to mercury poisoning.
- Town with a Dark Secret: Taiji itself