Thanks to the help of some activists that worked with Louis Psihoyos on his Oscar-winning documentary The Cove, a Santa Monica sushi restaurant was busted for selling endangered whale meat.  Wait, it gets better: The restaurant was called “The Hump.”

According to a search warrant, marine mammal activists were served whale during three separate visits to the restaurant. Federal labs confirmed the meat came from a Sei whale, an endangered species protected by international treaties, documents said.

In October, two activists posing as customers went to The Hump and ordered “omakase,” which means they let the chef choose the choicest fresh fish. They also requested whale and pocketed a sample.

The young women worked with Louie Psihoyos, director of the Oscar-winning documentary “The Cove,” to record the meal with a hidden camera and microphone. During the October restaurant visit, animal rights activist Crystal Galbraith, 27, and a friend who spoke fluent Japanese racked up a bill of $600, feasting on increasingly exotic dishes to gain the confidence of the waiters and chef.

“It was heartbreaking to eat an endangered animal, but I knew that I was doing it to save” the whales, said Galbraith, a vegan. “We were there eating for four hours. I felt so full and sick.”

The waitress brought out a dish of whale sushi, identifying the whale in English and Japanese, court documents said. The dish was listed as whale on the check and cost $85.

Court records say agents interviewed Kiyoshiro Yamamoto, a Culver City resident and a chef at The Hump for the past seven years, and he admitted serving whale to two young women. If convicted, Yamamoto could face a year in prison and a fine of up to $100,000. [AP]

Yamamoto went on to say that he did find it suspicious when the young woman began putting raw whale meat in her pocket, but was unable to chase after her on account of his raging boner.  …What?  It’s funny because it’s racist.

Is it just me, or does every food item in Japan come packaged with a smiling cartoon of whatever animal you’re eating on the outside?

The Cove is a documentary about the attempts of activists to document the brutal dolphin hunt at Taiji, Wakayama, Japan, and the selling of dolphin meat passed off as whale. (Gotta love Japan. “They’d never buy it if they knew it was panda meat, so I told them it was unicorn.”).  Naturally, to promote the film, the company behind The Cove made this series of comedy videos featuring a guy in a dolphin suit.  He raps, does stand up comedy, fights crime, poses for a sexy photo shoot, and plays beer pong.  It’s kind of funny, and possibly the strangest promotion ever.  It’s like one of those bad PSA segues from the 80s. “I hope you enjoyed the magic show, folks, but now I’m going to take a few seconds to talk to you about child rape, which is no laughing matter.”
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The Cove is the Sundance Audience Award-winning documentary about the dolphin trainer from Flipper‘s attempts to document the annual dolphin hunt in Taiji, Wakayama, Japan.  I saw some of the footage from these hunts in Earthlings (which is awesome if you like being scarred for life), and it was pretty much the gnarliest thing ever.  The fisherman surround the dolphins in boats, clank on the hulls to confuse the dolphins’ echolocation, then herd them into shallow water where they slit the dolphins throats while they flop around and gut them alive in front of their dolphin families.  So basically, an awesome date movie (supposedly that method of killing has since been banned). But anyway, the reviews of The Cove are saying the cool part about it is that it’s more like a heist flick than your average rich-people-who-love-to-hate-themselves animal rights essay.

The film’s true intrigue, however, lies not in the story it exposes, but in the process by which the crew attempts to capture the story itself. Director Louie Psihoyos and his eclectic team must overcome a daunting number of obstacles, including possible deportation and a run-in with the Yakuza, in order to capture the footage necessary for exposing the town and its terrible secret. [Examiner]

And if college catalogue covers have taught me anything, it’s that by eclectic they mean two white guys, a black guy, an Asian chick, and a fat kid in a wheelchair.  Also: It would be awesome if they trained one of the dolphins to infiltrate the Yakuza.

[Available in HD at Apple]

This is the trailer for The Cove, which won the audience award for documentaries at Sundance.  It takes place in a remote Japanese town, but the trailer keeps things a bit mysterious. “If you didn’t know what was going on over here, you’d think this was a town that really loved dolphins and whales.”  Hmm, so what is going on there?  Let’s see… Japan… dolphins… Is it… Animals being brutally slaughtered?  Let’s go with that.  When it’s Japan, just answer “brutal slaughter” or “karaoke”. You’ll always have a 50% shot.

[via Cinematical]