The Power Of Art: Who Is Shamu?

One of the themes of Blackfish is that orcas are highly intelligent, self-aware, social beings. In short, they are individuals.

However, SeaWorld’s marketing and presentation of killer whales–through its promotion of every whale as a single whale, Shamu–works to erase the idea that each killer whale in SeaWorld’s “collection” is a distinctive, unique, killer whale, with its own individual experience and history, and its own identity.

That doesn’t sit well with Lee Harrison and James Wolf, and they have created this powerful and moving graphic to drive home the fact that there is no Shamu, that instead there are multiple killer whales with multiple fates.

Here is how Harrison (you can see more of his work here) explains the project:

“This idea came to me when I recalled some of the orcas that have died and have been forgotten based on SeaWorld’s ‘sweeping it under the rug’ ways.

I wanted to create awareness by drawing attention to some of the more shocking and upsetting stories we know of in a simple way to get people more interested to discover more.

The simple and pleasing visuals seem to draw people in, while the stories shock them and they tend to ask more.”

And here is what he and Wolf (who in encyclopedic when it comes to SeaWorld’s killer whales and their histories) produced (click image for a version you can enlarge):

For more a more detailed presentation of this art, and the life histories of the killer whales featured, go to OrcaAware.

Blackfish On CNN

Last night, CNN Films aired Blackfish, and gave the issue of killer whales in captivity extraordinary exposure. (If you missed it, CNN will re-broadcast Blackfish this Sunday at 9 pm EST).

As part of the lead-up I appeared on Crossfire, with hosts Van Jones and Newt Gingrich. Across the table, taking the opposing view of killer whales in captivity, was Grey Stafford, Director of Conservation at the Wildlife World Zoo and Aquarium.

You can watch part of the discussion here (it was a tough night for Stafford, I think; not even Newt Gingrich believes SeaWorld’s killer whale program is on the right track):

During the CNN broadcast, CNN assembled a great team to tweet live during the broadcast. Sadly, due to some sort of technical glitch my prolific effort to add background details to the film somehow never made it onto the Live Blog. But it’s worth checking out anyhow! And I think they will do it again during the re-broadcast of Blackfish on Sunday.

Overall, I was amazed and impressed by how many people CNN managed to engage in the issues and in the film. Yet another humbling lesson for a writer in the power of the visual medium!

Blackfish Blows Up

Former SeaWorld trainer John Hargrove talks killer whale's with HBO's Bill Maher. — Former SeaWorld trainer John Hargrove talks killer whale’s with HBO’s Bill Maher.

It’s been a big week, with Blackfish opening last night in LA and NYC. And I guess it was getting enough notice as the open approached that the suits at SeaWorld, or corporate owner Blackstone, got twitchy. After mostly ignoring Blackfish for the past few months and I guess hoping it wouldn’t get much public notice, SeaWorld hired PR firm 42 West to lead a campaign to blast the film. I analyze how that’s going over at Outside:

But now, with Blackfish getting good buzz and opening tonight in New York and Los Angeles (as well as in many other US cities and abroad in coming weeks), the billion-dollar theme park hasbroken its virtual silence on the film and has belatedly started to fight. In an e-mail blast to film critics last weekend that called Blackfish “shamefully dishonest, deliberately misleading, and scientifically inaccurate” (you can read SeaWorld’s complaints, and the Blackfishresponses, here) and in interviews with ABC News and the New York Times, SeaWorld is doing what it can to try to inoculate audiences and the public against the critical portrayal of how SeaWorld over the years has managed Tilikum and its captive orca entertainment business.

The challenge for SeaWorld’s PR effort, even though its e-mail broadside quoted Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s well-known aphorism on opinion and fact—“You are entitled to your opinion. But you are not entitled to your own facts”—is that the facts are not really on SeaWorld’s side.

SeaWorld’s attack on Blackfish has generated so much media that I can’t come close to keeping up with the Google alerts. But if you want a sense of what sort of critical reception Blackfish is receiving, Rotten Tomatoes has a compilation of reviews.

A Comic’s Take On Killer Whale Training

Comedian Doug Stanhope pulls no punches….at all. You’ll cringe at points, especially in his treatment of Dawn Brancheau, but boy does he nail it.

(h/t Jordan Waltz)

Blackfish Goes Wide

After a long festival run, Blackfish is finally hitting general theaters. There is a premiere in LA tonight, and then it rolls out in selected theaters across the country.

Here’s the current schedule:

play dates

Opening7/19/2013
New York, NY: Sunshine Cinema 5
New York, NY: Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center
West Los Angeles, CA: The Landmark 12

7/26/2013
Berkeley, CA: Shattuck Cinemas 10
Cambridge, MA: Kendall Square Cinema 9
Chicago, IL: Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema
Evanston, IL: CineArts 6 – Evanston
Maitland, FL: Enzian Theatre
Manhasset, NY: Manhasset Cinemas 3
Minneapolis, MN: Lagoon Cinema
Montclair, NJ: Clairidge Cinemas 6
Mountain View, CA: Century Cinema 16 – Mtn View
Philadelphia, PA: Ritz 5 Movies
San Diego, CA: Hillcrest Cinemas
San Francisco, CA: Century Centre 9
San Francisco, CA: Sundance Kabuki Cinemas
San Rafael, CA: Regency Cinema 6
Santa Ana, CA: South Coast Village 3
Washington, DC: E Street Cinema
White Plains, NY: Cinema 100 Quad

8/2/2013
Atlanta, GA: Midtown Art Cinemas 8
Austin, TX: Arbor Cinemas at Great Hills 8
Austin, TX: Violet Crown Cinemas
Aventura, FL: Aventura Mall 24 Theatres
Baltimore, MD: Charles Theatre
Boca Raton, FL: Living Room Cinema 4
Frontenac, MO: Plaza Frontenac Cinema
Houston, TX: Sundance Cinemas Houston
Lake Buena Vista, FL: Downtown Disney 24
Miami, FL: O Cinema
Portland, OR: Fox Tower 10
Rancho Mirage, CA: Century @ the River 15
Royal Oak, MI: Main Art Theatre
Seattle, WA: Seven Gables Theatre

8/4/2013
Gloucester, MA: Cape Ann Community Cinema

8/9/2013
Albuquerque, NM: Century 14 Downtown
Boulder, CO: Century 16
Columbus, OH: Gateway Film Center 8
Denver, CO: Chez Artiste
Las Vegas, NV: Century Suncoast 16
Madison, WI: Sundance Cinemas Madison
San Antonio, TX: Santikos Bijou Cinema Bistro 6
Santa Fe, NM: The Screen
Santa Rosa, CA: Summerfield Cinemas 5
Sarasota, FL: Burns Court
Scottsdale, AZ: Camelview 5 Theatre

8/11/2013
Albuquerque, NM: Guild

8/16/2013
Bellingham, WA: Pickford Film Center 3
Cleveland Heights, OH: Cedar Lee Theatres
Ithaca, NY: Cinemapolis 5
Kansas City, MO: Tivoli @ Manor Square
Rochester, NY: Little Theatre

8/23/2013
Charlotte, NC: Manor Theatre 2
Dallas, TX: Angelika Film Center and Cafe
Honolulu, HI: Kahala Theatres 8

8/28/2013
Gainesville, FL: Hippodrome – Gainesville

8/30/2013
Boise, ID: The Flicks 4
Dayton, OH: New Neon Movies
Knoxville, TN: Downtown West Cinema 8
Pelham, NY: Pelham Picture House

9/7/2013
Bradenton, FL: Lakewood Ranch 6

Blackfish Movie Trailer

Fresh from the kickass movie-trailer production facility. Check it:

Tilikum Back In The Day

A Tilikum “Splash” segment from the video archives of former SeaWorld trainer Jeffrey Ventre.

From the show producer: “Oh boy, where’s he going?”

Nowhere, it turns out. Tilikum has been doing this segment for almost three decades since this was shot. And a lot has happened over that period of time.

OSHA vs. SeaWorld: Hearing Update

Local 6 was in the courtroom, and Local 6 has a report on how the day went:

In court Thursday, SeaWorld lawyers said the company consulted with marine mammal experts from the Georgia Aquarium and Atlantis Resorts in the Bahamas to establish its own minimum distances trainers can interact with killer whales. Neither facility houses killer whales.

According to SeaWorld Animal Training Curator Kelly Flaherty Clark, trainers are now required to stay three feet away from killer whales if they are kneeling on a flat surface. Trainers must be 18 inches from the edge of the pool if they standing near the whales, she said.

Clark testified that trainers may still touch a killer whale or rub its back while standing next to the animal on a submerged ledge in the pool, as long as the trainer is positioned along the side of the animal’s body between its blowhole and tail. The trainer must stay away from the whale’s mouth and tail and have an escape route if the whale were to move, said Clark.

Under cross examination by OSHA lawyers, Clark acknowleged a killer whale can potentially spin 360 degrees on the submerged ledge as a trainer stands next to it. OSHA lawyers point out that it is up to the employees themselves to determine whether the whale might attempt to hurt them.

“Everything we did was about making sure my employees were safe,” testified Clark, who said no SeaWorld trainers have been injured since Dawn Brancheau was drowned by a killer whale in 2010. “We haven’t even had a scraped knee.”

Judge Welsch must know more about SeaWorld and killer whales than he ever dreamed possible. Following the hearing he will rule on whether SeaWorld had a good excuse for missing last July’s deadline to be in compliance with his ruling that trainers must maintain a minimum separation or work from behind a barrier.

I don’t think he will care as much about whether SeaWorld has suffered any scraped knees, as he will about the question of whether SeaWorld had any legal justification to ignore his ruling and avoid compliance. Some judges might take that hard.

SeaWorld Vs OSHA (Round 412)

They are in court again right now, debating trainer-killer whale protocols, and an Orlando reporter is live-tweeting the proceedings.

Blackfish Screening Schedule Now Up

Nice. I can finally answer questions about when and where Blackfish might be screening by pointing fans to the Screenings link on the Blackfish The Movie Facebook page.

Here’s what’s on tap so far:

April 17th Bermuda International Film Festival

April 25th-27th London Sundance Festival

April 27th and May 1st San Francisco International Film Festival

April 29th Boston Indepedent Film Festival

April 30th – May 3rd Hot Docs, Toronto

May 4th Montclair Film Festival, New Jersey

May 24th – 27th Mountainfilm Telluride

May 3rd -11th Docville, Belgium

May 9th – 16th Green Film Festival, Seoul

May 31st – June 5th Cinemambiente, Italy

June 5th -16th Sydney International Film Festival