This is the story told by the American documentary "Black Whale", which participated in this year's Oscar competition for best documentary, and finally returned. The story takes place in Florida in the United States. In the local aquarium, a large killer whale named Tilikum, in front of all the audience, bit Miss Dawn's arm and dragged her during the performance. into deep water. When the others rescued Miss Dawn, she had stopped breathing, and there were scars all over her body, which was horrible to see. The film interviewed relevant personnel and asked them to tell the camera in an attempt to restore the truth of the entire case.
Watching such a film, the audience has to be patient, and people of all colors are waiting to talk from beginning to end. Most of them are animal trainers who have danced with killer whales, operators and managers of Ocean World, and relatives of animal trainers who have been killed by killer whales. They are narrating the scene at that time and recalling the past events; they are either accusing the injustice of the garden, or venting their depression and dissatisfaction, or crying about the thoughts of their deceased relatives or friends, or desperately trying to absolve himself of his responsibilities. Chattering, all kinds of clues are messed up. But as the story goes deeper, the clues gradually become clear, and the whole case becomes complete.
It's a dark story about a marine animal show place. The killer in this case was of course the killer whale named Tilikum, but someone else was responsible for this series of tragedies. The story goes back more than 30 years, and the memories of an old man who hunted whales allow us to understand the root of this tragedy.
At that time, Tilikum was just three years old, still a small whale, living happily in the vast ocean with his parents and his entire family. In that ocean, killer whales have been swimming for a long time. This is the largest animal in the ocean and a very intelligent animal. It can communicate in dozens of different voices and is extremely rich in emotion. They live in groups by blood and are a matriarchal society. The average male whale can live to fifty or sixty years old, while the female whale's life is much longer, up to a hundred years old. Of course, this is also an extremely ferocious predator, and they are the overlords of the ocean.
However, this ocean overlord has a stronger opponent, that is, humans. His cleverness and his handsome black and white physique make him the most popular performer in various marine parks. If there is demand, there will naturally be hunting, and the high profits have made a whaling company eye the Tilikum family. They formed a fleet to drive the Tilikum family to the bay and capture them. Of course, killer whales are highly intelligent animals, they are divided into two groups, a few adult whales escape to another bay to attract whaling fleet, while Tilikum's mother etc. take it, secretly Swim to another bay to avoid being pursued. But they forget that humans have higher IQs and advanced tools.
Their whereabouts were traced by aircraft, and at the end of the bay, the inescapable killer whale was trapped in the shallow sea, and Tilikum was captured. Seeing that the young Tilikum was salvaged from the water, its mother wailed beside her, reluctant to leave for a long time. They were so large and expensive to transport that the whaling crews did not catch them, but killed them, stuffed their bodies with rocks, and sank them into the sea. The three-year-old Tilikum is being hanged in the air, witnessing the tragic death of his mother, what kind of feeling is it in his heart? What kind of wounds will its young mind have?
The days of training in the aquarium were not all smooth sailing. The young Tilikum was rejected by other killer whales. During the growth process, it had no friends and just grew up alone. It was kept alone in a corner of the whale pond because of frequent fights with other whales. When other killer whales were frolic, it could only lick the wound silently, suppressing its pain and anger.
The narrow pool failed to stop its growth, and Tilikum was an adult, strong and sturdy, the largest killer whale in the marine park. It remained solitary, had little communication with other killer whales, and was full of aggression. Because of its strength, it also became a sperm donor, and it has dozens of offspring scattered in marine parks across the United States. However, its offspring are not obtained by natural means, but by artificial insemination, and the movie shows us the process of extracting it. Such a process is quite humiliating for an animal with only an IQ, and it may add serious wounds to Tilikum's already scarred soul.
What it witnessed would make Tilikum even more irritable. A mother whale gave birth to a calf, and while they were frolicing happily, the calf was sold to another marine park by humans. The mother whale cried, and it kept making a low-frequency sound, calling for its baby, because it knew that the baby would be transported to a long distance, and the low-frequency sound could reach a long distance, it hoped its baby I could hear my mother's cry. It cried out in agony for many days, ignoring the consolations of other female whales. Will this situation remind Tilikum of his own life experience?
The same training every day, the pain of eating and drinking only when he is obedient, makes Tilikum accumulate more dissatisfaction. Its explosion stems from a small thing. In the training before the performance, Tilikum, who was already very angry, was still listening to the instructions of the animal trainer Dawn, doing various movements. It was well done and should have been rewarded for being able to eat a few fish. However, it missed the whistle and failed to eat the fish. By the time it's done all training and it's time to play, there's no more fish in the bucket to eat. Its anger can be imagined. But it still calmly followed Miss Dwayne to the performance pool, and in front of everyone's eyes, it quietly killed Dwayne. And Dawn is just another ghost under the mouth of Tilikum, and she has been killed by a trainer before.
It's a fairly complete serial killer story, just between humans and animals. If we replaced Tilikum with a human, would we call it a serial killer with a dark heart? Isn't it a tragic story? Tilikum had a tragic childhood, growing up in a small space with barriers to communication. Growing up, I had to work a job I didn't like, and I was humiliated. In such an environment, it would be strange not to be perverted. Because it's just a killer whale, people just use it as a tool for entertainment, ignoring its emotional needs. Scientists have proved that the emotional world of killer whales is far richer and more complex than humans.
I'm not a conservationist, but this film still makes me saddened by Tilikum's fate. Undoubtedly, human beings are at the top of the life chain of the whole earth. For other animals and plants, human beings are like gods. This is a reality that we cannot and need not change, the inevitable result of natural competition. We are in a race with other beings, and we have won everything. However, this does not give us the power to dominate other life and to do whatever we want on this planet that all life shares. What we should do is to give due respect to other lives, and each life has its own dignity. Reverence for life is actually a reason for human beings to exist.
At the end of the film, Tilikum and other killer whales in the marine park are released into the ocean. They slowly swim towards the depths of the ocean, swimming in the vast space, enjoying the long-lost freedom. It's just that I'm a little worried, can Tilikum, who grew up in a small space, still survive in the ocean?
View more about Blackfish reviews
