Mission Blue : A Documentary Analysis : Mission Blue

Blackfish shows all of rhetorical situations throughout the documentary. The rhetor in Blackfish is Gabriela Cowperthwaite, the director. The audience is Sea World customers or potential customers. The purpose of the documentary Blackfish is to inform people on how damaging mentally and physically it is to keep an orca whales captive. The exigence in this documentary is that holding killer whale’s captive and it is very dangerous mentally and physically to the whale, but also can be dangerous for the workers. The constraints in Blackfish is that the film may appear to be slightly biased against SeaWorld, making the audience see only one side of the issue. The affordances are you get to see live footage from the harmful attacks and listen to real life stories that people that witnessed it. Cowperthwaite goes on and appealeed to Pathos, Ethos, and Logos to create awareness on the harm of keeping killer whale’s captive.

A documentary is an expository text that informs its audience about an issue person or event using visual and auditory conventions to convey a message. Documentaries are often used to reveal an unusual, interesting or unknown angle. Topics are limited only by one's imagination. The documentary Blackfish is the story of Tilikum, a captive killer whale that has taken the lives of several people, it underscores problems within the sea-park industry, man's relationship to nature, and how little has been learned about these highly intelligent mammals. This documentary was directed by Gabriela Cowperthwaite. The ideas that orcas are wild and unpredictable, Seaworld’s treatment of orcas are inhumane and Seaworld’s was negligent in their training of their trainers. These ideas are shown throughout the documentary as visual techniques of Celebrity figure, expert opinion, audio codes, the documentary technique of interviews, archival footage and written codes. I think these ideas in the documentary are quite true and are well proven throughout the documentary.

In 2013 Gabriela Cowperthwaite produced and directed the documentary “Blackfish”. This documentary mainly focused on the issues behind killer whales being held in captivity such as at the famous amusement park Sea World, instead of the open ocean. Some negative outcomes of these animals being confined to such small spaces is, many accounts have been documented of the whales being agitated and having an aggressive tone with other whales and the trainers as well that work with them. A handful of these are human deaths caused by the orca whales. Throughout the documentary the director uses the Rhetorical strategies ethos, pathos, and logos to persuade the audience and try to convince them that her argument has a valid point and can be

In the documentary “Blackfish”, directed by Gabriela Cowperthawaite in 2013, is asking the audience to take up a position on the inhumane treatment of whales in captivity. In particular, she invites us to feel sympathy for the whales and anger toward SeaWorld cruelty and denial of culpability. Cowperthawaite makes choices of visual image, language, sound and structure achieve her outstanding outcomes.

In the documentary “Blackfish,” there are rhetorical devices that are used to send off different thoughts about orca whales being held in captivity in such a limited space. Many of these devices try to give off certain feelings to the emotions and the mind through different people’s opinions. A device that is most used throughout this documentary is logos, meaning more facts are included and convincing the audience to pick more of one side than another. Shown through the documentary, many points from different people are told and give off plenty of emotions for the viewers that watch the documentary. Many facts are given off throughout this whole documentary, however the way that the people say it gives it more of two aspects that

    The filmmaker practices various forms of Rhetorical devices to persuade the audience to believe that the ruling in the OSHA vs. SeaWorld case was indeed the appropriate option. Example of pathos in the documentary were when the trainers describing their time working at SeaWorld and the bond some of them had with Dawn it provides a chance for the viewers to bond with the trainers. Another example is when the fisherman, John Crowe, recollects the experience and emotions he had while capturing the baby orcas “We’re there trying to get the young orca into the stretcher and the whole famn damily is out here 25 yards away, maybe in a big line and they’re communicating back and forth, well you understand then what you’re doing, you know. I lost it. I mean I just started crying.” An example of Ethos is when the neuroscientist empathizes the intelligence of the orcas. The final device in the documentary is logos. Logos is utilized when the orca researcher, Howard Garrett, evaluate the behavior of the orcas in captivity and compare it to the orcas in the wild.

The purpose of the film was to call the target audience of environmentalists into action to help save the Virunga National Park. At the end of the documentary, there is a link that provides more information on how to further help out the cause, which is further adding to the logos of the argument, by providing a source. Through all of the rhetorical strategies and the numerous appeals to ethos, pathos, and logos throughout the documentary, the director effectively persuaded the target audience to join the cause of protecting the Virunga National Park against further SOCO destruction and rebel

In the well-known documentary, Blackfish portrays what really happens behind the closed walls of SeaWorld and the enclosure of killer orcas. The purpose of this film was to give an inside look into the controversial life of whales and trainers. The audience was able to witness unfortunate events during SeaWorld shows and the capturing of the mammals. Many witnesses were interviewed to give factual and opinionated evidence. The usage of rhetorical devices in the documentary such as Ethos, Logos and Pathos contributes to its persuasive stance that although orcas can be kind and friendly mammals, being kept as performing animals can have deadly consequences.

Ensuring that the cast of a documentary are real people and not actors is also a technique that The Cove incorporates to create a sense of realism. The entire cast of The Cove are established activists who were well known prior to the film for the work they have contributed towards marine protection in organizations such as ‘The Ocean Preservation Society’ and ‘The Sea Sheppard Conservation Society’. Short clips of Ric O’Barry’s history with Flipper the dolphin, and news clips concerning his several arrests were displayed various times during the documentary. Moreover, the featuring of established politicians such as Japan’s International Whaling Commission (IWC) delegate, Joji Morishita and Japan 's Fisheries Agency Hideki Moronuki, assists in visually showing the audience that the cast and featured people are not actors, and have been working in their current field for years. These codes and conventions of naturalistic aesthetics concerning content, constructs a sense of realism due to the information and footage presented being filmed from ‘the real world’.

In 2009, Dr. Sylvia Earle wrote The World is Blue to educate and alert the reader about human impacts on marine ecosystems. Through this book she conveys her passion and methodical arguments concerning the importance of the conservation of the ocean, which encompasses approximately 80 percent of the earth’s surface. Dr. Earle states “the ocean touches you with every breath you take, every drop of water you drink, every bite you consume” (17). This statement emphasizes the significance of the ocean, not only for marine life, but all life forms on earth. The book implies that currently in today’s world, the conservation of the ocean requires a global effort to reduce human damage from the past generations. Using facts gleaned from credible scientific resources, she defines the problems of overfishing, bycatch, and pollution. By analyzing human impacts on marine ecosystems, Dr. Earle determines successful and unsuccessful solutions to these problems and suggests various ways individuals can change their lifestyles to reduce impact on the environment as a whole.

Casey starts with the fascinating theory from the reference of story about Captain Charles Moore who turned from his route and adopts a new route when he was returning to Southern California from a sailing race. In that new route which Moore called as North Pacific subtropical gyre; he and his crew saw lot of plastic things in that area due to which activity of marine life in that area was completely abolished. By starting her article with this story of Moore, Casey stresses the importance of issue of plastic as pollutants in our oceans and readies his readers for a proposition related illuminate the issue of plastic pollution in oceans. A rhetorical analysis uncovers the fluctuating degrees of progress with which Casey utilizes logos, pathos, and ethos: while Casey's ethos is solid due to the notoriety she conveys to her writing and her utilization of pathos to speak to her intended interest group of individuals living close to oceans or beach front zones; his utilization of logos is powerless. It can be said that this article could have been more effective and stronger if Casey would have write clear words about the solution of the problems of plastic in oceans. She just has discussed it with acceptable facts but there is no clear recommendations at all levels. Casey is gifted in argumentation and her solid ethos is effective to compensate for with string support for her thesis that we have to take care of the issue of plastic that our oceans

Is a documentary always more realistic than fiction film? If so, why? If not, why not? What makes a film more or less realistic?

The Blue Whale project was another successful action for community involvement. The Jacobs Family Gallery became the Museum’s center of activity. The Jacobs Family provides the Museum donation of 1 000 000 USD.

and green. Blue as discussed earlier was represented as the color of the God and other religious concepts, so the major incorporation of the color blue in the reliquary chasse indicated the spiritual significance it carried. Envisioning blue on the chasse unified people to Jesus Christ. Many of the reliquary chasse of the 12th century narrated a story; this individual one narrates the crucifixion of Christ. There are several key figures engraved throughout the exterior of the chasse, however since the crucial scene of the execution are shown on the front face of the chasse, that indicates that this chasse was primarily to be seen from the front rather than the sides. If viewed from the front, the top has three figures designed on it. In the center is the God the Father and on his either sides are two unknown saints. All three figures are represented in mandorlas however in different colors. The God of Father is displayed in the blue mandorla while the saints are shown in green mandorla. Here we can interpret a sense of hierarchy because the God of Father is shown in blue, which represents a divine color, however the saints are represented in green that is a mix of blue and yellow. So, blue still exists and represents divinity, yet the mixture of blue and yellow to produce a different shade of blue signifies that the God of Father is above and more important than the saints.

The 1986 film The Mission depicts the relation of the Jesuits as a type of enlightening force for the Guarani people, that is able to organized theses people in way that was not before possible. The representation of the priest as these great liberators of knowledge by the movie is flattery, the natives where indeed capable of organizing themselves as a society that the films choses to ignore. The Guarani where not the pure molds that the movie presents, they contained there own original and optioned ideas on how society works after contact with the Jesuits and in the missions, a notable example of their ideas can be seen in religion. The natives are shown throughout the film of having weak constitution to their traditional spirituality, and this was not the cause in history. My argument is, the Guarini where not the passive molds for Christianity presented in the film, but where actually relatively organized in them believes of spirituality and held strong options on the subject. Supporting the argument against the films take will include: Ruiz de Montoya’s The Spiritual Conquest, a primary source form the prospective of a Jesuit priest during the time of The Mission; James Schofield Seager’s The Mission and Historical Missions: Film and the Writing of History, focuses on the historical issues riddled within the film; and lecture notes form Dr. Austin, discussing the actuality of what occurred in during the time period of The Mission.