People are terrible. Sometimes. I always liked that quote in The United States of Leland where Don Cheadle says, “I'm only human,” and Ryan Gosling replies with, “It's funny how people only do that after they do something bad.” Humans have a lot of good in them, but they also have a lot of greed and selfishness in them. Anything for a buck – this is, after all, the American way, isn't it? Not exclusively American, of course, but it does seem to be our modus operandi. Remember, though, several years ago, the Oscar-winning documentary The Cove? It's fantastic – and brutal. It is about illegal dolphin poaching in Japan; there is a secret cove where the perpetrators would corral the dolphins and then slaughter them for their meat. People hem and haw when it comes to animal rights, and the subject is wide and open to lots of debate, but dolphins are intelligent creatures; it's a little different than slaughtering a cow.
Orcas are also incredibly intelligent, but we love to capture them and harness that intelligence for our entertainment at parks like Sea World. There is a famous case, the whale named Tilikum, who was captured off the coast of Iceland in 1983. Tilikum killed three people, including his trainer. It was described as “trainer error,” but there are those who make a strong case otherwise. This is the subject of the documentary Blackfish, playing now at Village 8 as part of the Louisville Exclusives series.
Village 8 is located at 4014 Dutchmans Lane. Further theater information and showtimes can be found at the Village 8 website.
Image: Internet Movie Database
