I pretty much chose this one for tonight because I had a dream about killer whales the night before. Plus, it has been on my list for awhile. It opens with music composed by the famous Ennio Morricone (John Carpenter's The Thing) eerily put to the sounds of orca songs and echolocation. Early on we are introduced to the two main characters, one a fisherman, Nolan, played by Richard Harris and a marine mammal biologist, Rachel, played by Charlotte Rampling. Honestly, the cast in this film is another reason this has been on my list for so long, including some small very early performances by Robert Carradine (of Revenge of the Nerds fame) and Bo Derek (10). After the characters witness a great white shark being killed by an orca, it cuts to Rachel mid-lecture. She discusses the intelligence of killer whales and states that they have a, "profound instinct for vengeance." Nolan, upon attending Rachel's classes is interested in capturing and selling one of these profoundly intelligent creatures to a zoo. He succeeds, but in his success unwittingly kills a female and her unborn calf, igniting her mate's vengeance against him. Nolan is very regretful and empathizes with the whale as he also lost his wife and child in a car accident, but it all comes down to a man vs. whale battle in the very end.
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| After killing the female, Nolan doesn't look that regretful |
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| It's the final showdown! (sung to Europe's "Final Countdown") |
At a time when we became more conscious of our impact on the environment, and the Endangered Species Act was passed and Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring" hit book shelves; Hollywood produced a lot of movies we classify into the "Natural Horror" sub-genre. Also partly because of Jaws but, I may be inferring this a bit, from 1960 to 1980 a lot of "nature strikes back" horror films were made, including Orca (1977). As an example from the film; Nolan asks the priest at his friend's funeral after he is killed by the rampaging orca, if you can commit a sin against an animal and the priest replies, "Sins are really against one's self." Which we can interpret as stating that our sin's against nature are not only harmful to it but to ourselves as well. Also, unlike others in the genre (Jaws again) Orca is also a dramatic piece about loss and suffering. The scene of the female losing her calf was much more disturbing than anything in Jaws or any other "natural horror" movies I have seen. In fact, the fake whales used in the film were so realistic that animal rights activists tried to stop the trucks transporting them to and from the set. With all of that in mind, I only give it two skulls because it was so far-fetched although a bit entertaining. I mean, the whale roared in anguish several times. It roared. ROARED. So silly.
| ROAR! |
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