For starters, the interviews in the movie are 3:1 anti-captivity vs pro-captivity stance. The first interview is with Samantha Goddard of the Born Free Foundation: an organization whose name tells you all you need to know about it. The second interview is with John Hargrove, one of the infamous main voices of Blackfish, who has conveniently never mentioned,up to this point, the fact he worked at Marineland of France. Next is Ingrid Visser, who takes up the bulk of the movie with her part. Only at the end does Jon Kershaw, the Zoological Director of Marineland get his say in the matter. At the end of the day 13 minutes and four seconds are dedicated the anti-captivity interviews, while only 10 minutes and twenty seconds are allotted for the pro-captivity side.
Goddard: 2:31-3:33 (1 minute 3 seconds)
Hargrove: 7:55-10:15 (2 minutes 45 seconds)
Visser: 10:26-16:07, 17:10-20:59 (9 minutes 16 seconds)
Kershaw: 21:35-31:55 (10 minutes 20 seconds)
I'm not going to go through this movie minute-by-minute like I did with Blackfish, but I do want to bring up some key points.
The movie opens with basically the same dialog as head in the trailer. I dislike how just twenty seconds in, they show two separate waterwork incidents, which much like Blackfish sends a very strong emotional message right out of the gate. Yes, I know we're only 20 seconds in, but it's hard for a neutral audience to have an open mind once they see this.
The whole "Europe has many Dolphinaria, and many are closer than you think," bit is said in a tone that is similar to what you might find when discussing a monster or other things of the sort. Look, I'm not trying to blow this out of proportion, but the way the sentence is worded sends the message that marine parks are these awful places 'that are still out there, and not off in some third world country that you feel a total disconnect to.'
At the point when Samantha Goddard is interviewed, she brings up stereotypical behavior of captive cetaceans, and one thing she mentions is food regurgitation, which is not a claim I have ever heard before about captivity (which is saying a lot, considering people actually believed the story done by The Onion which claimed that SeaWorld puts its' whales in plastic bags while their tanks are cleaned). I have been to five marine parks that house cetaceans (SeaWorld Orlando, Gulf World, Baltimore Aquarium, Mystic Aquarium and Marineland of Canada) and I have never once seen this behavior, nor have I ever before heard from antis that it is a behavior ever displayed, let alone a stereotypical behavior. Moving on...
One point that did intrigue me was at the 4:32 mark, Meah makes a specific point to show how there are hardly any guests interested in watching the dolphins in their free swim time, and how the vast majority of people only come to see the animals in the shows and then promptly move on after the show ends. This is a legitimate point to make. It is not necessarily commentary on captivity from a pro or anti perspective as much as it is commentary on humans and how we like to be entertained. You may agree or disagree with the use of cetaceans for entertainment purposes, but the fact remains that when these animals are simply displayed, as opposed to being presented in a show, there is little to no interest in the animals by the general public. But if you put the same animals in the same pool and set a training session to music, suddenly the same animals are fascinating majestic creatures that captures the attention of the audience.
Yes I'm going off on a tangent here, but I think this alone shows the importance of marine parks and yes, the use of cetaceans for entertainment purposes. Because while there are a select group of people who are very passionate about these animals, most are on one extreme end of the spectrum or the other when it comes to the debate of cetacean captivity. The reality is, there are not very many people who are either pro or anti captivity who are passionate enough to want to just watch an animal swim around, whether in the wild or in captivity. The majority of park guests want entertainment, and that is the only way to connect them with animals. Guests at SeaWorld will spend 25 minutes to sit through One Ocean, but will spend five minutes maximum at Shamu Underwater Viewing after the show. Why? Because the Shamu Show entertains them, while watching an orca in Underwater Viewing isn't as "rewarding" or "engaging" from their point of view. It's just a fact of life.
The show point is even something that Meah brings up a little later on, how the show makes "you feel like you're learning something. They've got so many facts [on the screen] how we're preserving the planet and how we're helping the species and it makes you feel like this is so right and everything has a purpose here...You can't blame people for enjoying themselves here, it seems so right. It seems like it's for education, a reason that's for good. People are laughing, they're clapping and they're learning." But after the show ends, everyone leaves and none of the guest seem to have any interest in the animals (beyond whatever feeling and information the show left them with).
In the interview with John Hargrove, he tells of approximately 35 waterwork aggression's he and another ex-SeaWorld trainer had been involved in at Marineland of France. However, according to all known records, only four major incidents have occurred at the park, and no fatalities.
Hargrove's use of the world "aggression" is convenient in that it is a very vague term, and could be interpreted in many ways. Hargrove later makes a loaded claim that "I personally drugged whales at Marineland," which is meant to sound awful. Captive orcas are given vitamins daily, and may be on medications for all sorts of medical reasons, part of which is preventative medicine. The phrase "I personally drugged whales" is not innately false, because Hargrove likely helped administer medications to the whales. However, he intentionally uses a word that has a negative connotation in order to give the impression that what he was doing was wrong. (Authors Note: Hargrove is notorious for deceptive phrases like this, which are not innately false, but are intentionally misleading. That is what upset me most about Blackfish: for the most part, they don't directly lie to you, but present the information in a way that is slanted and leads you to believe a certain side of the story.)
As to the section with Ingrid Visser, I have only this to say: she claims to study in the name of science, which is an absolute farce. The only reason Visser is even remotely interested in the cetacean captivity debate is because it is a huge business opportunity for her. She wants to open sea-pens where whales under the care of parks like SeaWorld and Marineland would send their whales. But is she actually interested in giving whales a better life? Probably not. But if SeaWorld alone sent their twenty one orcas to her sanctuary, you can't imagine the amount of money she would bring in. Visser has openly said that she intends to turn her sea-pens into a place where people could come and visit the whales. In other words, she wants to open up her own SeaWorld, except with in an uncontrolled environment which would pose an enormous amount of health risks for the whales. Long story short: she's only in it for the money.
One of the overarching themes of the movie that I disagree with is the philosophy that just because something is unnatural means it is wrong. Yes, a dolphin doing a foot-push or playing with a ball may not be the most "natural" behavior in the universe, but that does not mean that it is bad or harmful for the animal. I cannot stress this enough.
I do understand why the film shows how difficult it was to get in contact with Marineland park management, because it is a legitimate point. However, I understand why Marineland would be hesitant to participate in a movie that claims to be "equal and present both sides of the story," because that is exactly what Blackfish did when it was being filmed. I give Jon Kershaw a lot of credit in the end for agreeing to be interviewed, and going above and beyond by giving Jonny Meah a behind-the-scenes tour of the orca habitat and the bottlenose dolphin habitat.
One thing I found very interesting was when Kershaw basically called out SeaWorld asking why they ceased orca breeding. "We're still talking to [SeaWorld] about why, for a start, they would [stop breeding their orcas]...I'd really like to see the reasoning behind all of this to find out why it actually happened." Note: On May 6, 2017, France banned all cetacean breeding moving forward.
One thing worth noting is that Marineland of France is far from the standard that you would find at a SeaWorld park. In both the bottlenose dolphin pool and the orca pool, there are obvious signs of wear, such as rust and chipped paint, which you would never find at SeaWorld. Marineland is not AZA accredited, and while is not the "pride and joy" of the industry, it is still a good zoological facility.
In addition, female trainers are still allowed to hear their hair in a ponytail, something which SeaWorld has not allowed since the death of Dawn Brancheau on February 24, 2010: an obvious difference in safety standards.
Marineland did cease waterworks with their orcas following Dawn's death, as did Loro Parque. As of today, only Sea World Kamogawa (no affliation to the American SeaWorld) is the only park left in the world that still does waterworks.
The film ends with Jonny Meah giving his opinion on the captivity debate, effectively denouncing all cetacean captivity, claiming that "these animals are silently suffering in what can only be described as a modern day marine circus." Up until this point, I thought the movie did a reasonably good job remaining as neutral as one could realistically in this day in age. However, once Meah took sides at the end, the film lost all its' credibility in my eyes. Inside The Tanks is a good film, but sadly, one that falls short of its' initial promise.
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