Blackfish and Freeman Documentaries Analysis Essay

A documentary is a long or short film that presents information on various topics for various audiences. The purpose of documentaries is to inform and engage, educate and entertain. Often documentaries provide an opportunity for the audience to engage in discussions on ideas and issues. Documentaries are an important form of filmmaking as they allow dialogue and a series of images to be collaboratively put together to captivate an audience like no other type of film. Two documentaries that provoke discussions on issues and ideas are Blackfish and Freeman. Blackfish is a long documentary about the capturing of orcas and the treatment they are given in SeaWorld and the consequences. Freeman is a shorter documentary about Indigenous Australian icon Cathy Freeman and her adversities during her prime performance  in the 2000 Olympics. 

Blackfish demonstrates entertainment and education in specific scenes using different film techniques to intrigue the audience such as music and animation. The director Gabriella Copperthwaite utilizes these two methods to influence the audience's thoughts during specific moments such as the interviewing of retired SeaWorld trainers and the introduction of the documentary. The music is used frequently throughout the film to set the mood of how the audience should be feeling, and can be conflicting to really manipulate the audience’s thoughts. An example of the use of music is when suspenseful music is playing in the background of the intro to create suspense and curiosity as the news plays simultaneously speaking on an orca murdering a SeaWorld trainer. Animation is used to show a diagram of how the orcas were caught along with clips of the orca hunters speaking on their strategy to capture the orcas as well as the severe guilt felt after catching the young orcas. 

Freeman portrays education and entertainment as its educational purpose comes from simply educating the audience of Cathy Freeman’s adversities and her achievements as an Indigenous Australian whilst simultaneously entertaining the audience. The director Laurence Billiet uses methods such as participatory mode and music to demonstrate specific moments of Freeman’s life such as when Freeman came 1st in the 1994 Commonwealth Games. Participatory mode was used during this scene as a vox pop was involved due to the reason that Freeman carried both the Australian and Aboriginal flag at the same time which was seen as very controversial back then as Aboriginals suffered from sever discrimination from white people. Music was used throughout the film in Freeman’s races to recreate the exhilarating feeling that Freeman had felt after completing her races and coming 1st. Nevertheless, documentaries are created to inform audiences about certain topics/subjects that are often overlooked, entertain all audiences and to record specific events.

However, documentaries can be manipulated to provoke discussions through certain ideas and issues that are controversial. Documentary films do this by using documentary modes and film techniques to shed light on topics that are often missed by the general people. Freeman and Blackfish commonly use participatory mode and actuality. For example, the Freeman documentary conducts discussion in a specific moment when Marie Jose Perec was allegedly caught fleeing Sydney right before the 400ms event in the 2000 Sydney Olympics. This moment was backed up by several news reports and live television footage during this time. Laurence Billiet applies actuality that was relevant during this time to portray the exact emotions of Cathy Freeman, as well as a voice-over from Freeman explaining her thoughts on her Olympic idol and rival’s sudden leave.

Blackfish provokes discussion through many moments seen throughout the film, such moments include the murder of Dawn, a professional trainer that was killed by Tilikum, or when retired trainers admit that instructors give out false information to the public to protect the fact that the orcas are being unethically treated in their facilities. Gabriella Copperthwaite really provokes these discussions by manipulating the music, interviews and the perspective to captivate the audience to the maximum. The effect leaves the audience suspenseful and shocked. Participatory mode is also utilized as the director is personally interviewing all the former trainers to get a direct source of information that is reliable to the audience, making the scenes all the more captivating. Altogether, documentaries can provoke discussion about certain ideas and issues by utilizing several documentary modes and film techniques, for instance in the films Blackfish and Freeman, the documentary mode called participatory mode is frequently used to manipulate the audience’s emotions and thoughts.

To conclude, documentary films are created to serve many purposes which include, to inform and engage, educate and to entertain. Documentaries have the ability to cover a wide selection of topics and specific events that may be overlooked by society. These documentaries present these topics using different film techniques and documentary modes. The films Blackfish and Freeman demonstrate these purposes by informing the audience about two individual topics, as well as providing entertainment and educating their audiences about possible unheard of subjects. Documentaries are a valuable source to study for future reference because they can increase a student’s knowledge on a wide range of topics from history, to science to nature.