Every year, thousands of dolphins are secretly killed in the Japanese fishing town of Taiji.
National Geographic photographer-turned-filmmaker Louie Psihoyos and a covert team documented the slaughter for the film, The Cove.
First, Psihoyos told Neal Conan, "we tried to do the story legally," visiting the Mayor and the Dolphin Hunting Union and offering to tell their side of the story. But instead of sharing their stories, "they started to threaten us, say it was going to be too dangerous to stay in town."
"That," Psihoyos remembers, "was a little bit like catnip for me. I felt like, what are they hiding that they don't want us to see?"
Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.