-Pathos-
Pathos can best be defined as an appeal to the emotions and values of the audience.
Ric O'Barry's role in The Cove makes heavy use of this appeal through his personal experiences with dolphins. His personal connection with the dolphin hunting and captivity industry allows the audience to feel his sadness and guilt over his involvement in this industry.
O'Barry makes a direct appeal to the values and morals of his audience through his involvement in the hit TV show Flipper. O'Barry believed that having the dolphins in captivity was a benefit to them. However, his entire opinion changed when one of the dolphins that he cared for committed suicide in his arms. This incident spurred the start of O'Barry's activism against dolphin captivity and helps to convey his strong moral compass to his audience. On the other hand, through their interactions with the fishermen who hunt the dolphins, the crew conveys to the audience that the fisherman know that their activities are illegal but continue to do it anyways. This establishes the fishermen as people of weak morality due to their willingness to not only break the law but also attempt to cover it up from the outside world. The documentary further establishes the fishermen as 'the group in the wrong' through the fact the crew is forced to illegally sneak into the cove at night in order to observe the dolphins before the slaughter the next day. The crew uses these incidents to establish that they are in the 'moral right' while the Taiji fishermen and on a more general scale, the entire dolphin hunting industry is in the 'moral wrong'.
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Psihoyos makes heavy use of both word and image choice in order to stir powerful emotion among the audience. Take for example the picture above showing the aftermath of a slaughter. In the documentary, this scene is is shown without any form of sound or commentary in order to emphasize the pure horror that the crew is feeling as they are documenting this. The crew successfully gives a personal feeling to the fact that thousands of dolphins and whales are being hunted and killed each year. Throughout the film, the crew shows images of the dolphins being captured and killed at points whenever there is a lull in tension. This technique keeps the horror and bloodshed of this industry fresh in the minds of the audience and helps to connect the statistics of both dolphins in captivity and hunted dolphins with their own personal emotions.
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Overall, the use of emotional appeal in The Cove allows Psihoyos and his crew to stir emotions of horror and indignation in the audience while connecting the cold, hard facts of the dolphin and whale hunting industry with the emotions of personally viewing the slaughter.