One of the great successes of Psihoyos’s film is its element of suspense, as the camera crew shadows renowned dolphin expert, Richard O’Barry, while he tries to gain entry into the well-guarded cove. The brisk cat and mouse drama is gripping, as O’Barry and his crew elude local police officers, petty bureaucrats and Japanese fishermen, who harass them as they move closer to the protected waters where the annual killings take place.

O’Barry became famous in the 1960s for capturing and training dolphins in the beloved TV show, Flipper. Airing from 1964 to 1967, the show became an instant classic and was likened to “an aquatic Lassie,” focusing on the clever hijinks of a bottlenose dolphin named Flipper. While the show introduced a generation of American children to the playful intelligence of dolphins, the untimely death of one of the five captured female dolphins, Kathy, led O’Barry to become an activist. O’Barry launched into a career to free dolphins from captivity, as the dolphin showcasing industry was just beginning to take off as an entertainment attraction.

In The Cove, O’Barry leads Psihoyos and his camera crew around Taiji, in a frantic race to expose the truth about dolphin abuse and capture it on film. He explains how the rise of SeaWorld, dolphin shows, and dolphin swim parks, have created an expensive niche market for the sale of these prized animals—selling for as much as $150,000 each. Taiji, Japan is ground zero for both the capture and slaughter of these beautiful mammals.

In the cover of darkness, O’Barry sneaks around the cove with the film crew, as they place hidden cameras in this secretive zone.
 When all is said and done, these daring filmmakers capture the horrifying scene of Japanese fisherman impaling dolphins, turning the waters red with blood and filling the cove with the eerie cry of dolphins, desperate to escape death. 
Ironically, Flipper, the show that exposed millions of Americans to one of the most intelligent mammals on the planet, has consequently been a source of their heartbreaking destruction. In a world where the ocean is marked with catastrophic decline, with the rate of decline accelerating, this senseless violence is beyond imagination.
 Despite repeated efforts to stop the killing, Japanese fishermen defend their annual slaughter as a form of “pest control.” Ultimately, hiding under the thin veil of “scientific study,” the slaughter of dolphins is unlikely to receive significant attention from the Japanese.