The dark and dangerous oceans come to play a major role in Netflix’s latest documentary film Seaspiracy. The film hit the tv networks platform on March 24th and since then has created both negative and positive responses as many reviews continued to pop up with titles along the lines of “Seaspiracy Harms More Than It Educates” or “Seaspiracy shows why we must treat fish not as seafood, but as wildlife”. These titles however give little to say about what the movie is actually about.

The film is about how as a boy British filmmaker and producer Ali Tabrizi was in love with the ocean and everything that it brought to the world. He loved the sea life, the beaches, the organisms living within, everything. However, when more and more articles popped up talking about whaling and the number of whales that were found washed up on beaches with their carcasses being filled to the brim with plastic, Ali’s picture-perfect view of the ocean and ocean life had been completely shattered.

To try to change this and recreate his original point of view, Ali originally went and started to clean up the beaches within his community. Every day he would go and he would pick up trash from a different beach trying to keep the beaches as clean as possible to prevent more plastic from going into the ocean. However, as time went on Ali’s point of view changed due to more articles popping up talking about the number of dolphin deaths in a year and how different species were declining rapidly.

All of this led Ali to make the decision to take a journey throughout the world and discover the mysteries that came and the horrible truth about parts of the world and humanity in itself. That journey is what became Seaspiracy.

One of my favorite parts of this documentary had to be the introduction. I loved how the film started with a camera dipping under and above the ocean’s surface before transferring over to an above-view shot of a boat traveling somewhere in the middle of the sea. It’s here that the story begins as someone begins to talk in a different language saying: “When ships are in the middle of the ocean… where problems occur… they can throw you overboard into the sea.” This simple sentence is perfect as in between each part of the sentence a span of photos and different shots appears creating a sense of mystery and tension. The photos consist of several parts of the film but put together they draw the reader in until the person says “if you’re scared of dying, go home.” As soon as that’s said the viewers are hooked.

From the introduction to the ending, I was hooked. Ali was able to create a film that completely shook my world upside down and made me astonished at what was going on in the world. As I watched the film I wanted to cry and scream at the world because of some of the things seen. More than 20 whales being slaughtered for food a day, dolphins being scapegoats for overfishing going on in certain areas of the world, more sharks being killed on a daily than I was able to think of, and so much more. It made me sick to our stomach knowing that this is what happens and this is what’s happening to our oceans.

To make things even better if you compare the ocean to Antarctica right now they’re pretty similar. Antarctica is slowly disappearing day by day with a seriously scary percentage of its ice melting amongst other things. It’s changing at a rapid pace and so are our oceans at one point in the documentary while Ali was talking about how fishes species were plummeting he stated:

“Perhaps one of the most shocking facts of all came from one of world fisheries experts estimating that if current fishing trends continue, we will see virtually empty oceans by the year 2048.” That is completely insane and it’s even crazier to see that this is just part of it. Like the icebergs in Antarctica that are melting on a daily and slowly disappearing, The coral reef is dying and is decaying as well.

As the film progresses, however, the shock keeps on coming. I found it unreal how terrifying it is to see people who are supposed to be helping oceans and make their company’s mission statements to help oceans be the ones actually helping to destroy oceans instead. Just like there are slaves on boats being forced to work and possibly even killed depending on what happens. It’s beyond crazy and sad what happens but at the same time, it’s eye-opening to see what really goes on.

Seaspiracy is a documentary created by Ali Tabrizi. It’s a film that in my mind deserves an award as it was perfectly filmed and it dived into the hidden truth of the sea and what madness goes on and is hidden from the news and from the human eye. It’s an eye-opener for sure and a film that astonished me and kept me captivated throughout the whole film for sure. With mixed reviews, both good and bad the one thing that can be said about this film is that it is outstanding and it is a film that I believe is a must-watch. If you’re looking for a good documentary to watch that is anything but boring and will change your look on life I can say without hesitancy that Seaspiracy is the perfect film for you.