Soul in the Sea

Even with my background as a marine biologist with years spent filming dolphins and whales I was still stunned by the experience. It was an easy decision to start filming, and for the next five months I mostly lived in my van, spending up to ten hours in or on the water each day. It didn’t take long to identify the main people around Moko and I was able to follow Kirsty on her mission to be Moko’s minder, along with the other locals who became part of Moko’s 'human pod'.

– Director Amy Taylor recalls when she first became familiar with Moko, Bay of Plenty Film, 9 June 2016

Here I was, 35, swimming with a dolphin for the first time. The next day I wanted to go and see him, and find out where he was...and the day after that, and the day after that. And within a couple of days I had this addiction.

– Kirsty Carrington on meeting Moko the dolphin, early in this documentary

When you’ve got an animal like this who wants to interact with people, it's very difficult for us under the Marine Mammals Protection Act. He definitely breaks the rules himself. If we were to go to the letter of the law, we would have thirty or forty thousand cases before the judiciary for everyone who's patted Moko.

– Department of Conservation Ranger Jamie Quirk on Moko's safety

I found out there's only been about 60 friendly lone dolphins like Moko, and one of them was here in New Zealand in 1955. But Opo only survived one summer with people. She was found dead a day after the law had been passed to protect her.

– Kirsty Carrington on previous encounters between dolphins and humans

Initially when it makes an appearance, everything's rosy, everyone's happy. And then the tensions rise. There's even threats locally that they were gonna shoot the dolphin . . . they said the dolphin's just annoying the shit out of people.

– Gisborne Fisheries Officer Martin Williams, on how attitudes to Moko changed

I was very interested in coming and seeing him here in Whakatane to see if there was any change in his behaviour, and yeah there pretty much has been an escalation of his interactions with people. He really instigates a lot of it . . . I think if you completely stop that, it would be to his detriment in the long run. I don't think that it's doing Moko any harm as long as we can control the people, and as long as people don't do stupid things.

– Marine Biologist Ingrid Visser on Moko's sociable behaviour

There's been situations that have put a bit of a downer on my day, and all I've wanted to do is just get in the water with Moko. Everything else can just leave me straight away as soon as I'm in the water with him.

– Kirsty Carrington on the impact Moko has had on her

We specifically have made sure that none of our staff actually enter the water. Because some of these people who get in the water with him constantly, they actually think they're the solution to Moko's issues, but they actually become part of the problem.

– Department of Conservation Ranger Jamie Quirk on limiting interaction with Moko

If we were to turn around and say 'well, the best thing we could do is not have interaction with him' I believe that that's not the answer as well. He is gonna find interaction no matter whether we take it out there to him, or whether he comes and tries to look for it anyway.

– Kirsty Carrington on Moko's friendly nature

Just because he steals boards off people and he also takes fish out of people's nets, and it's gonna just take one person to get a bit peeved off with that . . . he could create a lot of enemies. There's gonna be a time when something's gonna go seriously wrong.

– Grant Duffield on Moko's gregarious personality putting him in danger

...in cases like this with dolphins that have become friendly with people, its usually their undoing.

– One of those interviewed

Alternatively hearbreaking and heart-lifting . . . Beautifully shot and edited, it is a longer, more thought-out version of an initial work that screened on TV3 last year

– Waikato Times reviewer Mike Mather, 19 December 2013