The Shiranui Sea (不知火海, Shiranuikai) is a Japanese documentary made in 1975 by Noriaki Tsuchimoto.
It is the fourth in a series of independent documentaries that Tsuchimoto made of the mercury poisoning incident in Minamata, Japan.
Fisherman still knowingly catch and eat the mercury-laden fish caught in the beautiful Shiranui Sea because that is what they have always done and that is how they relate to nature.
The film scholar Justin Jesty wrote that The Shiranui Sea is "the crowning achievement of Tsuchimoto's first five years of engagement with mercury poisoning.
"[1] The documentarist Makoto Satō called The Shiranui Sea "the ultimate masterpiece" of Tsuchimoto's Minamata films;[2] and the filmmaker John Gianvito selected it as one of the ten best films of all time in the 2012 Sight and Sound poll.