Latest Documentaries
Why are ultra-processed foods so irresistible, and how they have come to dominate food culture? Dr Chris van Tulleken features interviews with former food industry insiders who talk openly about the way in which popular foods have been designed to be irresistible. Food companies go to extraordinary lengths to ensure their products connect with consumers - from using brain scans to assess the deliciousness of ice cream to carefully engineering the sound of a crunch. Ultra-processed foods are hyper-delicious and super-convenient, have long shelf lives and are extremely cheap. But a growing body of evidence is linking these products to our declining health.
2024 • Health
Episode Two follows the course of the invasion, as Strongbow wins victory after victory. In 1171 Henry II himself arrives to takes control of Ireland, and he grants land there to settlers from Britain. Now archaeology and cutting-edge science reveal their fascinating lives. The episode also shows how the conquest of Ireland enabled centuries of war between England and France.
S1E2 • Invasion: The Normans • 2023 • History
Episode One opens in the turmoil of 12th century Ireland, essentially a "Game of Thrones" society where provincial kings vie for supremacy. When two of these power players drive a rival into exile, he seeks help from Henry II, the Anglo-Norman king of England. Henry's vassal Strongbow and other Norman allies then invade Ireland with frightening power.
S1E1 • Invasion: The Normans • 2023 • History
Between 1931 and 1933, 4 million Ukrainians were to die of hunger. This famine was not preceded by any cataclysmic weather event, nor by a war. This was an ideological crime: decided by Stalin and approved by the Politburo, with the aim of punishing Ukrainian peasants who refused the collectivization of the countryside, cultivated a strong form of nationalism and showed resistance to communist ideology. The purpose of this famine, unprecedented in Soviet history, was to break all forms of opposition. How was it implemented? What was known at the time? What was said? What was seen? The most important event in pre-war Soviet history is taboo: all traces of it were immediately erased, and the evidence drowned in a flood of lies. And yet, within just two years, this famine killed twice as many Ukrainians as the gulag did Soviets in half a century. This state secret was particularly well-kept for more than fifty years and only revealed in its full magnitude after the disintegration of the USSR, when the archives were revealed. Drawing on previously unpublished material, on many Soviet films and on a number of particular points of view, including that of Welsh journalist and whistleblower Gareth Jones, this film retraces the story of that famine.
2022 • History
Much of life on earth is connected by a vast, hidden network that we are only just beginning to understand. Out of sight, between the world of plants and animals, another realm exists - the kingdom of fungi. Passionate biologist and writer Merlin Sheldrake travels the globe, exploring the secret world of fungi. Through dazzling images of fungi under the microscope and all around us in the forest, Merlin unravels the many secrets of these essential organisms. So much more than mushrooms, not only do fungi shape the weather and support life on land, they are also at the cutting edge of medical research and even have the power to break down plastic waste. This film takes us from the ancient Tasmanian Tarkine rainforest to the mystical wilds of China's Yunnan Province, in search of solutions to some of our planet's biggest challenges. Can the answers be found in the wonderful world of fungi?
2023 • Nature
BBC Scotland's political editor Glenn Campbell fell off his bike in June 2023. Alone on a country road with broken bones, he feared for his life and felt he'd had a lucky escape when help came his way. But six weeks after his accident, just as he was getting ready to go back to work, he had a seizure. He was diagnosed with incurable brain cancer, turning his world as he knew it upside down. In this film, Glenn shares his experience of living with a brain tumour and explores why treatments for the condition have barely changed in many years. Early in his cancer journey, Glenn realised there was nothing he could do to change his health outcomes, but the one thing he could do was tell his story. Glenn says, 'It's a golden rule as a journalist not to become the story, but in this case, I just felt that it was worth sharing my personal experience as a way of putting a bit of a spotlight on this most difficult of cancers.' Supported by family, friends and colleagues, Glenn has documented his story during what has been a very difficult year of gruelling treatment and endless uncertainty. Following surgery, which saw his malignant tumour removed successfully, he embarked on radiotherapy and chemotherapy. He also lives with the constant threat of seizures and has made the decision to share some very personal footage filmed while in the midst of one such episode. Brain cancer is the biggest cancer killer of people under 40. Every day, 33 people in the UK are diagnosed with a brain tumour. Motivated by his own shortened lifespan and the stories of friends made in the cancer community, Glenn has spent a huge amount of time and energy in the past year raising awareness of this often-misunderstood cancer. In this intimate film, we see the committed newsman in a different light as he faces down his mortality and considers what matters most in life. Sitting on the beach at Machir Bay on Islay – the island he hails from – he reflects: 'You realise what really matters, and maybe what doesn't quite so much. What really matters is family and friends and good times and making memories, and what maybe doesn't matter is the hubbub of everyday life, work and chores. I think being told you've got a life-limiting condition really puts that into perspective.'
2024 • Health
Focuses on the intense rivalry between two visionaries and founders of contesting rocket companies, Chris Kemp and Peter Beck.
2024 • Astronomy
Explores the digital afterlife business. What if a person's death did not mean the end of their life? What if their loved ones could still talk to them long after their body has been cremated or is lying lifeless in the ground? What sounds like the scenario of a science fiction movie is already offered by companies today. By using AI, these startups create avatars of deceased people to allow their loved ones to interact with them. Eternal You tells the story of a human experiment: what does it do to people to resurrect their deceased loved ones in order to talk to them? Who takes responsibility for the psychological and ethical consequences? And do we even want all this?
2024 • Technology
The federal welfare state controlled American capitalism until the 1973 oil crisis and recession, which led to the election of the ultra-liberal Ronald Reagan. At the dawn of the computer revolution, a generation of entrepreneurs, including Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, emerged in Silicon Valley around Stanford University, which combined public and private research.
S1E3 • American Capitalism – The Cult of Wealth • 2023 • Economics
The millionaires' paradise was destroyed by the crash of 1929, which plunged the country into the Great Depression and mass unemployment. Enraged by greed and tax evasion, Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt, reelected in 1936, advocated controlled capitalism.
S1E2 • American Capitalism – The Cult of Wealth • 2023 • Economics
At the end of the 19th century, a club of millionaires — John D. Rockefeller and his oil monopoly, steel king and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie and banker J. P. Morgan, who financed the Industrial Revolution from Wall Street — took over the United States, where immigrants provided a labor force that was ruthlessly exploited.
S1E1 • American Capitalism – The Cult of Wealth • 2023 • Economics
The year is 1066 and the Vikings are no longer engaged in coastal raids and pillaging monasteries, but in a fight for the throne of England. The Norman Duke William is determined to take the island. In this final episode we will discover what novel tactics William used and how he managed to conquer England once and for all. This is a tumultuous and historic event, and it will also be the last battle of the Vikings.
S1E4 • The Last Journey of the Vikings • 2019 • History
Recommended Documentaries
The fifth programme explores the alliances formed between the animal and plant worlds. It examines the ways in which plants live together and rely on each other. Whether living together in harmony, relying on each other for homes, protection or food, or living off each other, by strangling or otherwise destroying each other in a bid to survive.
S1E5 • Private Life of Plants • 1995 • Nature
Travel to 19th century England and meet Michael Faraday, a child of poverty who grew up to invent the motor and the generator. His ideas about electricity and discovery of magnetic fields changed the world and paved the way for future scientists to make giant strides in the world of high technology and instantaneous communication.
S1E10 • Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey • Astronomy
In France, perfidy and treason plunge the French Kingdom into chaos. Behind new king Charles IX, Catherine de Medici rules in the background as master of the throne. However, she is unable to prevent a civil war.
S2E3 • The Real War of Thrones: The True History of Europe • 2018 • History
Chris Packham, Liz Bonnin and Steve Backshall explore our oceans and its wildlife, to find out how marine life is coping in the face of increasing environmental pressure.
S1E1 • Blue Planet Live • 2019 • Nature
The opioid epidemic has devastated America. But what is the situation here? A new report from Public Health England raises serious concerns about Britain's own relationship with painkillers. Dr Michael Mosley embarks on an immersive journey to Britain’s opioid frontline and meets patients struggling with addiction and GPs fighting a constant battle to help those suffering from chronic pain. He also uncovers worrying evidence of people abusing over-the-counter opioids and discovers how easy it is to buy strong opioids online.
Dr Kevin Fong makes a personal journey through the moral questions about death that face not just the medical profession, but each and every one of us. The question of how we die is a question that all of us must face, and yet we avoid talking about it. Modern medicine is focused on saving lives. Amazing technical advances have increased doctors' ability to treat a wide range of life-threatening diseases, meaning many more people live longer lives. Life expectancy has surged, and we regard death as something to be battled. It is common for the medical system to throw everything into treating patients right to the very end. But in our attempts to defeat death, the question is this - are we over-medicalising death and the final years of life at the expense of providing better palliative care that would result in a better quality of life? Is it time to reset the system, and learn how to die a better death? Kevin meets medical professionals who are at the heart of these dilemmas, as well as people who are right now facing up to the question of how to die a better death.
Science Documentaries
Are we in fact living in a simulation? This is the question postulated, wrestled with, and ultimately argued for in the latest provocation from acclaimed documentary stylist Rodney Ascher (Room 237, The Nightmare) through archival footage, compelling interviews with real people shrouded in digital avatars, and a collection of cases from some of our most iconoclastic figures in contemporary culture.
2021 • Science
Poverty, women's rights, climate change - indeed, many of the world's most pressing challenges - can be explained by answering one simple question: Can you turn your lights on in the morning?
2019 • Science
A two-hour special from the producers of "Making Stuff" Where do nature's building blocks, called the elements, come from? They're the hidden ingredients of everything in our world, from the carbon in our bodies to the metals in our smartphones. To unlock their secrets, David Pogue, technology columnist and lively host of Nova’s popular "Making Stuff" series, spins viewers through the world of weird, extreme chemistry: the strongest acids, the deadliest poisons, the universe's most abundant elements, and the rarest of the rare—substances cooked up in atom smashers that flicker into existence for only fractions of a second.
In the final part, Professor Al-Khalili uncovers tales of success and heartache in the story of chemists' battle to control and combine the elements, and build our modern world. He reveals the dramatic breakthroughs which harnessed their might to release almost unimaginable power, and he journeys to the centre of modern day alchemy, where scientists are attempting to command the extreme forces of nature and create brand new elements.
S1E3 • Chemistry: A Volatile History • 2010 • Science
"It's alive!" Since Dr. Frankenstein spoke those famous words, we've been alternately enthralled and terrified by the idea of creating life in the lab. Now, a revolution in genetic engineering and thrilling innovations in synthetic biology are bringing that dream—or nightmare, as the case may be—closer to reality. New tools allow researchers to use cells to create their own DNA and edit it into existing genomes with more ease and less cost than ever before. Along with renewed hopes for treating some genetic diseases, there's serious talk of using the newest technologies to bring long-extinct animals back from the dead – like the team hoping to resurrect the woolly mammoth. Science fiction is quickly becoming science fact. NOVA Wonders explores the benefits and the burden of risk surrounding the controversial new technology
5 • Nova Wonders • 2018 • Science
Can the participants work out why they exist at all? Is it destiny or pure chance?
Part 3 • Genius by Stephen Hawking • 2016 • Science
Environment Documentaries
When Earth gets hit by a a massive chunk of the Sun known as a deadly Solar Storm, our planet's electrical system turns into a smoking ruin. How does modern civilization cope without power?
S1E5 • Doomsday: 10 Ways the World Will End • 2016 • Environment
A crew of women embarked on an ambitious sailing expedition around the UK to raise awareness of ocean plastic and sample the water to see what damage is being done. Hannah Thomas-Peter joined them on the month-long voyage and documented their voyage of discovery.
2017 • Environment
This episode focuses on the Asia-Pacific side of The Pacific Rim of Fire, which stands as a living testament to the beauty and danger that powerful geologic forces can deliver. The Pacific Rim is home to half of the world's active volcanoes and ninety percent of the world's earthquakes, yet nearly 800 million people continue to live within its violent edge. Our journey begins in New Zealand, a land of volcanoes and earthquakes, where we find a 500-kilometre long slip-strike fault deep under the Pacific Ocean. Geologist Hamish Campbell will take us to the crater of White Island, the country’s most active volcano. Then we'll visit the country's southern island with John Youngson, to find out how New Zealand’s longest fault-line contributes to the gold industry. Finally in Japan, viewers will hike up to Mount Fuji – the iconic peak where science and legend converge, getting up-close and personal with a fault-line witnessing firsthand what it’s like to discover new ways of monitoring, and hopefully one day predicting, seismic activity onboard the world’s most advanced drilling vessels.
S50E07 • The Nature of Things • 2010 • Environment
It's amazing to think that in the 1900s a mere tenth of the world's population lived and worked in cities. Now it is over half. With soaring populations, how will we keep our cities live-able? And what will the city of tomorrow look like?
4/10 • Catalyst: Season 1 • 2015 • Environment
Iain looks at the big picture of Earth's place in space. It's taken four and a half billions years and several great catastrophes to turn it from a barren rock to the unique planet we know today.
Prince William, Sir David Attenborough and astronaut Naoko Yamazaki hear the personal stories of people who are directly affected by air pollution and look at possible solutions.
S1E3 • The Earthshot Prize Repairing Our Planet • 2021 • Environment
Randoms! Documentaries
From flower meadows to the rich open landscapes of our mountains some extraordinary and dramatic wildlife stories are revealed. Featuring bees that lay their eggs in empty snail shells, brown hares performing spring boxing courtship routines, and how large blue butterflies have come back from the brink of extinction.
S1E3 • Wild Isles • 2023 • Nature
Follow Three women at risk of developing Alzheimer’s join a groundbreaking study to try to prevent the disease, while sharing their ups and downs, anxiously watching for symptoms, and hoping they can make a difference. Barb, Sigrid, and Karen all had mothers with Alzheimer’s and witnessed first hand the devastation wrought by the disease, not only on the mind and body, but on patients’ families.
New evidence is rewriting the history of our solar system, and using the latest discoveries and cutting-edge tech, experts are investigating if our cosmic neighborhood once featured oversized alien Earths and a second Sun.
Space's Deepest Secrets • 2019 • Astronomy
The dramatic story of the D-Day landings and of the liberation of Paris. In the east the Soviets liberate Auschwitz and fight their way to the heart of Berlin. Germany finally surrenders, but Japan fights on until the atom bombs are dropped.
S1E6 • Apocalypse: The Second World War • 2009 • History
Elephant seals are the first animals to return to the beaches of the subantarctic islands in spring, forming large breeding colonies, where the males fight fierce battles to gain and retain permanent access to a large number of females. They mate with the females as soon as they are receptive again. Millions of Macaroni Penguins form huge colonies on the islands to breed.
S1E2 • Life in the Freezer • 2003 • Nature
This programme explores the way our experiences shape our minds and bodies as we make the journey from the most helpless to the most sophisticated organism on earth. Dr Chris and Dr Xand van Tullekan uncover how we develop new skills - whether riding a bike or learning to walk.
S1E3 • The Human Body: Secrets of Your Life Revealed • 2017 • Health