With Who Let the Docs Out now taking applications, here are a couple of quick thoughts from an evaluation of Blackfish.

Blackfish is the film everyone points to. A few years ago I looked at whether it actually caused SeaWorld’s troubles, using stock market data and interviews with 26 people from marine parks, zoo associations, animal welfare NGOs, the film crew, marine science and narrative research. (Blackfish paper; plain-English write-up in The Conversation). We used General Elimination Methodology to test the competing explanations. Some didn’t hold up. In 2013 SeaWorld’s Orlando and California parks lost visitors while Universal and Disney gained them, so tighter household budgets can’t explain the drop.

Blackfish did contribute to the fall in attendance and share price, the redesigned orca show and the end of the breeding programme. Interviewees put its impact down to four things:

• Distribution. CNN aired it roughly 40 to 50 times, and the CNN branding made it read as news to a lot of viewers.
• Content. Empathy for Tilikum, plus anger at a company that had not been straight with the public.
• Timing. It landed on decades of campaigning, along with Free Willy, The Cove and the book Death at SeaWorld, and campaigners were ready to use it.
• SeaWorld’s own response, which was slow and defensive.

Some advice for farmed animal documentary filmmakers:

1. Ask who will pick the film up and use it. Blackfish had a single company to target and campaigns ready to go.
2. Budget for distribution as seriously as production.
3. Views and social engagement tell you about reach. Plan from the start how you’d find out whether anything changed, even if the answer is qualitative.

Happy to talk to any filmmakers or funders thinking about evaluation.