Blackfish, the documentary

Blackfish is the name of a documentary directed by Gabriela Cowperthwaite, released at the Sundance Film Festival in 2013.

The documentary focuses on a killer whale in, Tilikum, that killed 3 people, including his trainer, Dawn Brancheau, on Sea World in the U.S, and shows the consequences and questions that come up of the captivity of animals.

 In February of 2010, when Dawn Brancheau dies after the attack of Tilikum, the hipotesis to explain the accident was that the trainer tied her hair in a pony tail and the whale has a reaction because of that, but Cowperthwaite, by doing interviews and researches with people related to the case and former trainers from Sea World, concluding that the ways to capture Tilikum and the conditions of captivity contributed to his aggression.

Gabriela Cowperthwaite also questioned the entire Sea World speech about captivity, that ensures that marine animals live longer in captivity than in the sea.

In the documentary one of the thing that shocked me the most was the testimonies of the former trainers from Sea World, because they explain how they bonded with the animals. Also they tell that in the shows, when they do the tricks with the whales, they have to explain that whales lived in good conditions, and after they retired and with the death of Dawn they can question that speech.

The existence of documentary as “Blackfish” helps create awareness of the limits that we should have, as a species, for our entertainment.