Artists Peter Fischli and David Weiss create the ultimate Rube Goldberg machine. The pair used found objects to construct a complex, interdependent contraption in an empty warehouse. When set in motion, a domino-like chain reaction ripples through the complex of imaginative devices. Fire, water, the laws of gravity, and chemistry determine the life-cycle of the objects. The process reveals a story concerning cause and effect, mechanism and art, and improbability and precision, in an extended science project that will mesmerize the mind.
Tim Jenison, a Texas based inventor, attempts to solve one of the greatest mysteries in all art: How did Dutch Master Johannes Vermeer manage to paint so photo-realistically 150 years before the invention of photography? Spanning a decade, Jenison's adventure takes him to Holland, on a pilgrimage to the North coast of Yorkshire to meet artista David Hockney, and eventually even to Buckingham Palace. The epic research project Jenison embarques on is as extraordinary as what he discovers.
Morgan Spurlock subjects himself to a diet based only on McDonald's fast food three times a day for thirty days without exercising to try to prove why so many Americans are fat or obese. He submits himself to a complete check-up by three doctors, comparing his weight along the way, resulting in a scary conclusion.
Some of the world's most innovative documentary filmmakers will explore the hidden side of everything.
The creative processes of avant-garde composer Philip Glass and progressive director/designer Robert Wilson are examined in this film. It documents their collaboration on this tradition breaking opera.
Spring comes every year and brings us hope for recovery and development. But time is inexorable and fleeting. Not for everyone will come next spring ...
That might seem a bizarre statement, coming a century after Einstein showed that gravity is the result of matter warping space and time around it.
"The Last Dragon" is a nature mockumentary about a British scientific team that attempts to understand the unique incredible beasts that have fascinated people for ages. CGI is used to create the dragons.
This unusual film, narrated by Orson Welles, records the day-by-day events in the lives of six oceanauts who, in an unique experiment, spent 27 days 328 feet below the surface of the Mediterranean. The experiment originated with the French scientist and explorer, Jacques-Yves Cousteau, on whose work the idea of oceanic exploration is based. The film shows the preparation and training needed for the expedition and the working conditions both inside and outside Conshelf Three, a specially made steel bubble which served as home and laboratory.
The film was shot as the final part of the play "Drink the sea, Xanthos" theatre-Studio "NEO" (St. Petersburg 1987-1989). As a result, the performance was changed and the film gained independence. He became an allegory of acting.
What happened after Einstein fled Nazi Germany? Using archival footage and his own words, this docudrama dives into the mind of a tortured genius.
People looking at the Mona Lisa in the Louvre – or are they just looking at themselves?
The Stanford prison experiment was a landmark psychological study of the human response to captivity, in particular, to the real world circumstances of prison life, and the effects of imposed social roles on behaviour. It was conducted in 1971 by a team of researchers led by Philip Zimbardo of Stanford University.
Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity has revolutionised our understanding of gravity, space and time. Initially acclaimed, then forgotten, and now rediscovered, the adventure of this hundred-year-old theory has marked the scientific history of the 20th century. From its inception, a mathematical difficulty arose that could have nipped the theory in the bud: the Schwarzschild singularity. In the company of great international relativistic physicists, the viewer embarks on a discovery of this theory with a singular destiny. We discover a "curved" universe that proves to be even stranger than Einstein had envisioned, and harbours some objects - such as black holes - that still challenge today's scientists.
Explore how one man's relentless drive and invention of the atomic bomb changed the nature of war forever, led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people and unleashed mass hysteria.
For generations, we have believed that man is driven by ruthless self-interest. But over the past decade, this idea has been increasingly challenged. New research from fields as diverse as political science, psychology, sociology and experimental economics is forcing us to rethink human actions and motivation. ‘The Altruism Revolution’ examines the scientific reasons behind the call for a more caring society.
Documentary film exploring the rise of mechanistic philosophy and the exploitation of human beings under modern hierarchical systems. Topics covered include behaviorism, scientific management, workplace democracy, schooling, frustration-aggression hypothesis, and human experimentation.
Who invented time, who invented the clock? Why 1 hour, why 60 minutes, why 60 seconds? Since prehistoric times, man has sought to measure time, to organize social and religious life, to plan food supply... Today we can surf the Internet, geolocate, pay by credit card… All our daily lives depend on time and the synchronization of clocks. The history of the invention of time and of the ways and instruments to measure it is a long story…
For this behemoth, Bressane took his opera omnia and edited it in an order that first adheres to historical chronology but soon starts to move backwards and forward. The various pasts – the 60s, the 80s, the 2000s – comment on each other in a way that sheds light on Bressane’s themes and obsessions, which become increasingly apparent and finally, a whole idea of cinema reveals itself to the curious and patient viewer. Will Bressane, from now on, rework The Long Voyage of the Yellow Bus when he makes another film? Is this his latest beginning? Why not, for the eternally young master maverick seems to embark on a maiden voyage with each and every new film!
One man's journey to discover the bitter truth about sugar. Damon Gameau embarks on a unique experiment to document the effects of a high sugar diet on a healthy body, consuming only foods that are commonly perceived as 'healthy'. Through this entertaining and informative journey, Damon highlights some of the issues that plague the sugar industry, and where sugar lurks on supermarket shelves.