History Film / OrcaTheKillerWhale

* {{Bookends}}: The movie starts with the orca and his mate cavorting underwater, HappilyMarried and expecting a baby, on a beautiful and sunny day. It ends with the now-widowed orca swimming underwater by himself, under ice. Both sequences are accompanied by the theme song.

** While the script keeps referring to the titular orca as a male, close-ups of its underside reveal that it's clearly female. This would actually make more sense than the alternative, as orca males are promiscuous and have nothing to do with their mates after copulation, but a ''sister or daughter'' [[MamaBear will fight to protect an endangered pod member, and might plausibly carry a grudge]].

** [[spoiler:The Orca kills Nolan by using its tail to throw him high into the air and letting the impact do him in. This is something Orcas actually use to kill seals.]]

* {{Bookends}}: The movie starts with the orca and his mate cavorting underwater, HappilyMarried and expecting a baby, on a beautiful and sunny day. It ends with the now-widowed orca swimming underwater by himself, under ice. Both sequences are accompanied by the them song.

* SanitySlippage: Nolan starts losing his mind over the orca. While subtle at first, it finally becomes apparent when Nolan translates the orca's speech as it saying Nolan is "his drunk driver", as if the whale would have any way of knowing Nolan [[spoiler:lost his own wife and unborn child to one]] or what being drunk or driving even are.

* UngratefulBastard: Sort of: the Orca rescuing one of Nolan's crew from certain death only prompts Nolan to try to capture it instead -- although it was Rachel's student assistant who got rescued and he wasn't one of Nolan's crew until halfway through the film. [[SuddenDeath Shortest career-change ever, too.]]

* EmpatheticEnvironment: Nolan and his crew leave his sunny coast side village and travel further north until the final deadly confrontation takes place in the artic circle, surrounded by ice.

** It is constantly repeated that orcas are intelligent, and they are known to be so in RealLife. However, many actions of the orca in this film - starting and exploiting a peer pressure to get Nolan to fight orca, crippling the town's economy by destroying the fishing business it's dependent on, or setting a fire to a refinery - would require not merely ''intelligence'', but a very different thing, ''knowledge''.

* CruelAndUnusualDeath: When the whale finally corners Nolan, [[spoiler: he doesn't just smash the ice flow Nolan is on and end things; he tilts it, allowing Nolan to slowly but surely slide into the freezing water, screaming in terror all the while. Then, once Nola is in the water, the whale doesn't go right in for the kill. He instead slowly swims circles around Nolan, all as Nolan desperately tries to tread water while certainly succumbing to hypothermia, before finally sending the man flying headfirst into the ice with a blow from his tail.]] If that isn't ColdBloodedTorture, at least so much as the whale is able to give, then what is?

* SanitySlippage: Nolan starts losing his mind over the orca. While subtle at first, it finally becomes apparent when Nolan translates the orca's speech as it saying Nolan is "his drunk driver", as if the whale would have any way of knowing Nolan [[spoiler:lost his own wife and unborn child to one]] or what being drunk or driving even is.

* RoaringRampageOfRevenge: The reason the Orca is going on the warpath: Nolan accidentally killed his mate and unborn child. [[spoiler:Notably, after it kills Nolan, it spares Bedford as she had nothing to do with his mate and child’s death.]]

* WhyDontYouJustShootHim: In-universe; after Nolan gawks at the whale instead of shooting it while it roars for a good fifteen seconds,

* CruelAndUnusualDeath: When the whale finally corners Nolan, [[spoiler: he doesn't just smash the ice flow Nolan is on and end thing. He tilts it allowing Nolan to slowly but surely slide into the freezing water, screaming in terror all the while. Then, once Nola is in the water, the whale doesn't go right in for the kill. He instead slowly swims circles around Nolan, all as Nolan desperately tries to tread water while certainly succumbing to hypothermia, before finally sending the man flying headfirst into the ice with a blow from his tail.]] If that isn't ColdBloodedTorture, at least so much as the whale is able to give, then what is?

* CruelAndUnusualDeath: When the whale finally corners Nolan, [[spoiler: he doesn't just smash the ice flow Nolan is on, He tilts it allowing Nolan to slowly but surely slide into the freezing water. Then, he doesn't go right in for the kill. He slowly swims circles around Nolan, all as he tries to stay afloat while certainly succumbing to hypothermia, before finally sending the man flying headfirst into the ice with a blow from his tail.]] If that isn't ColdBloodedTorture, at least so much as the whale is able to give, then what is?

* CruelAndUnsusualDeath: When the whale finally corners Nolan, [[spoiler: he doesn't just smash the ice flow Nolan is on, He tilts it allowing Nolan to slowly but surely slide into the freezing water. Then, he doesn't go right in for the kill. He slowly swims circles around Nolan, all as he tries to stay afloat while certainly succumbing to hypothermia, before finally sending the man flying headfirst into the ice with a blow from his tail.]] If that isn't ColdBloodedTorture, at least so much as the whale is able to give, then what is?

* AdvertisedExtra: [[spoiler: Creator/KeenanWynn is billed fourth, yet his character, Gus Novak, doesn't even survive the first reel.]]

* DeadStarWalking: [[spoiler: Creator/KeenanWynn, who based on name recognition, and the fact that the character, Gus Novak, is Nolan's second in command, seems set up to play a prominent role in the film. Instead, he's the first victim, and he's killed off in the film's first reel.]]

* ArtisticLicenseLaw: The local fishermen are uwilling to kill the orca in the bay, fearing serious legal consequences. Orcas were not a protected species in The70s, and anyway, they would be legally justified in killing an animal that threatens to collapse the local fishing-dependent economy and causes human deaths.

** The Orca wants revenge on Nolan and co for killing it's mate and child.

* CrusadingWidower: The Orca is a non-human example, wanting revenge for the death of his mate.