The director of a documentary featuring the lives and voices of Japanese people who support whaling has started a campaign on an international crowd-funding site in hopes of screening her film in the United States.
Keiko Yagi, the director of "Behind the Cove — The Quiet Japanese Speak Out!" said Monday she believes it is important to provide the American public with "a chance to hear the other side of the debate on the whaling issue."
Her 107-minute movie is touted as a "counter" documentary to the Oscar-winning U.S. film "The Cove," which threw the Wakayama Prefecture whaling town of Taiji into the international spotlight with bloody scenes of its annual dolphin hunt.
Yagi said she has been contacted by some Americans saying they want to see her film, and that arrangements are underway to screen it at two prominent independent theaters in Los Angeles and New York.
Her fundraising campaign is at the Indiegogo website.
The film, made last year, has been screened across Japan.