SHARKWATER

The troubling topic of the film (the fate of sharks) is overshadowed by the distracting ego of the filmmaker.

If you ever wonder why such folks as David Attenborough, Sigourney Weaver, and Liev Schrieber tend to be the go-to people when it comes to narrating documentaries, you need to look no further than the film Sharkwater. What is an important and often shocking film about the oft-misunderstood predator of the sea that is being hunted to extinction without protection, is almost pulled under by the narration of its filmmaker, Rob Stewart. Stewart, a handsome young biologist with a passion for sharks, has a voice that sounds like a cross between a surfer dude and Stef from Pretty in Pink. His constant presence makes Sharkwater a wobbly piece that profiles its maker almost as much as its subject.

With many factoids splashed across a black screen, profiling how sharks' numbers have been reduced by 90% because of the appalling acting of "shark-finning"—where sharks are captured and their fins cut off, to be sold mainly to Asia as a food delicacy—has no problem making its point. If you are at all squeamish or sensitive to real-life brutality, you must be warned that this is not a beautiful nature documentary a la Planet Earth or Winged Migration. There are very graphic images of sharks being pulled from the water, their fins and tails being sliced off while they are still alive, then their bodies being tossed overboard to sink, where the sharks then suffocate. I myself have never thought of sharks as cuddly and cute, as Stewart seems to, but the image of a sharking blinking as men sawed off its appendages will truly haunt me.

Rob Stewart's passion has him seeking out skipper Paul Watson of Greenpeace, and he joins his ship the Sea Shepherd as it heads to Costa Rica, one of the few remaining hotbeds for sharks. En route, they encounter a ship illegally shark-finning off of Guatamala, and suddenly the film turns into a Greenpeace doc. This is not necessarily bad, per se, as it is facinating to see ships ramming each other and trying to bully through sheer force. The Sea Shepherd folks end up getting arrested (despite being given the go-ahead to bring in the illegal fisherman), and find themselves actually fleeing port once they figure out how closely entwined the mafia is in the shark-finning industry.

At this point, I found that the focus was more on people than on the sharks themselves. This is not a documentary filmed entirely underwater, profiling the life of a shark (though the underwater photography that is featured is inarguably gorgeous and impressive). Much of the doc exposes the practices of the humans that may be destroying not just sharks, but the underwater ecosystem. But also much of the doc seems to focus a bit too much on Stewart himself, showing reaction shots, poorly staged moments where he pretends to answer an important phone call, and a curious interlude where he is holed up in a Central American hospital because of flesh-eating backteria creeping up his leg. (Did we really need to see him pulling an IV from his hand, seemingly for the camera?)

Despite the dominance of the filmmaker in his own film, Sharkwater is still important and eye-opening. In addition to the absolutely shocking images of the finning itself, perhaps most shocking was the revelation of the huge mafia-run black market industry in Costa Rica itself, and country that thrives on eco-tourism. Shame on them. By the end of the film, it is implied that things in Costa Rica, and other shark habitats like the Galapagos Islands may be changing for the better, but there is obviously a lot of work to be done, before it is too late.