In the spring of 2017 Wild Lens released the half hour documentary Souls of the Vermilion Sea about the struggle to save the vaquita, the world’s most endangered marine mammal. We had a very targeted outreach and distribution plan for this film – we wanted to use the documentary as a tool to influence the outcome of the issue through education and outreach. Because the vaquita is a small porpoise that lives only in the Northern Gulf of California, this region in Northwestern Mexico was our most important focus area.
After organizing a series of targeted screenings in Mexico, China, and the US, we began to seek funding and partnerships that would allow us to produce a feature length film geared towards a more general audience. We showed our film Souls of the Vermilion Sea to a variety of potential funders, partner groups and production companies, most of whom were quite reluctant to get involved with such a dire topic – the vaquita was facing the very real prospect of extinction.
In the summer of 2017 we were introduced to Andrea Crosta, the founder of a group called Elephant Action League. Andrea’s organization conducts undercover investigations into wildlife crime issues, and he was thinking about launching an investigation into the trade in illegal swim bladders from a fish called the totoaba. The totoaba is a large fish that is endemic to the Gulf of California, and also considered to be endangered. Although it’s illegal to fish for totoaba, many fisherman take the risk because the swim bladder of the totoaba is worth tens of thousands of dollars in China. Vaquita become entangled and die in these totoaba nets, and this illegal fishery is now the main driver of the vaquita’s decline through by-catch.
So we were very interested in documenting Andrea’s efforts, and he connected us with another filmmaker that he knew – Richard Ladkani, director of The Ivory Game, a critically acclaimed feature length documentary about the illegal ivory trade. Richard, it turns out, was also exploring the idea of making a documentary about the issue surrounding the vaquita and the totoaba, and we immediately began talking about the potential for collaboration. Richard’s questions dug right to the heart of the issue, making it clear that he had a strong interest in telling this story.
A few months previous it had been announced that the Mexican government would make a high profile attempt to capture the last remaining vaquitas and bring them into a temporary sanctuary. This effort was seen as the last chance to prevent the vaquita’s extinction, and it was scheduled to begin in the fall of 2017. Time was extremely limited, so although the interest was there, it initially seemed like it would be impossible to pull off this complicated shoot.
A few weeks later we got an email from Richard indicating that we needed to talk as soon as possible. On a Skype call, we learned that Leonardo DiCaprio’s production company Appian Way had reached out to Richard, as well as the CEO of Terra Mater Factual Studios, and expressed interest in collaborating on a feature length documentary about the vaquita. The connection with Appian Way would provide exclusive access to the entire capture mission, making the project logistically feasible. Richard organized a conference call with the producers from Terra Mater Factual Studios, who he had worked with on The Ivory Game, and we embarked upon a grand collaboration that would result in the new film, Sea of Shadows.
Now, on the eve of the film’s premiere at Sundance Film Festival, the situation facing the vaquita population is extremely dire. Fewer than 15 individuals remain in the wild, and the likelihood of the species surviving this extinction crisis is extremely low. This situation places great weight on Sea of Shadows, not just because of the potential for the film to influence the outcome of the vaquita issue, but also because of it’s ability to share lessons learned from the vaquita that might prevent future extinctions. Sundance provides one of the most significant platforms to showcase documentary films, and we intend to take advantage of this opportunity and use this situation to benefit not just the vaquita, but the larger extinction crisis currently facing this planet.