Central Park • 2016 • episode "Part 3" • New York: America's Busiest City

93:47

Jan Leeming narrates a look at controversies, scandals and surprises in TV, film, music and politics in 1988, including Salman Rushdie's book The Satanic Verses igniting a literary and religious firestorm and Ian Paisley daring to heckle the Pope. On the global stage, US president Ronald Reagan and USSR leader Mikhail Gorbachev reshaped geopolitics, while a soundbite from Tory MP Edwina Currie dented the UK's confidence in eggs, leading to a nationwide salmonella scare.

S1E4 • Controversially: That Was the Year that Was • 2023 • Economics

114:56

The Bomb tells the story of the most powerful and destructive device ever invented. Learn how humans harnessed this incredible power and what challenges we have faced living with it since 1945. With newly restored footage of nuclear weaponry, some of which has only recently been declassified, go behind the scenes of the first atomic bomb, revealing how it was developed and how it changed the planet, ushering in a new era and reshaping our lives even today. Rare footage from bomb tests through the 1950s and 60s demonstrates the power and strangely compelling beauty of nuclear explosions. Hear from foremost nuclear bomb historian Richard Rhodes, former Secretary of Defense William Perry, and former Secretary of State George Shultz, as well as from scientists, weapons designers, pilots, witnesses, and ordinary men and women who have lived and worked with the nuclear bomb. Examine the choices society has made--and continues to make--to live with an invention that could destroy the planet.

2015 • Economics

59:35

In the autumn of 2007, Matthew Lee, a worried accounting executive at Lehman Brothers, began to notice serious financial irregularities in the company's practices. When he refused to approve tens of billions of dollars' worth of suspicious transactions, he was fired. Six months later, Lehman Brothers sank with 631 billion dollars of debt. Lee, who has since emerged as a crucial figure in Lehman's downfall, and other whistleblowers recount their personal stories of fraud and deception that went right to the top of the bank. Ultimately, they paid the price for trying to expose the 2008 subprime mortgage crisis.

Storyville • 2019 • Economics

81:20

Explores our economic, historical and emotional entanglement with oil, by looking at the conflicting imperatives around North Sea oil. This invisible machine at the core of our economy and society now faces an uncertain future as activists and investors demand change - is this the end of oil? By highlighting the complexities of how oil is embedded in our society - from high finance to cheap consumer goods – this documentary brings together a wide range of voices, from oil company executives and economists, to young activists and pension fund managers, and considers how this machine can be tamed, dismantled or repurposed. We have five to ten years to control our oil addiction, and yet the licensing of new oil fields continues in direct contradiction with the Paris Climate Agreement. This documentary looks at how the drama of global climate action is playing out in the fight over North Sea oil.

2022 • Economics

70:43

The global economy is in crisis. The exponential exhaustion of natural resources, declining productivity, slow growth, rising unemployment, and steep inequality, forces us to rethink our economic models. Where do we go from here? In this feature-length documentary, social and economic theorist Jeremy Rifkin lays out a road map to usher in a new economic system. A Third Industrial Revolution is unfolding with the convergence of three pivotal technologies: an ultra-fast 5G communication internet, a renewable energy internet, and a driverless mobility internet, all connected to the Internet of Things embedded across society and the environment. This 21st century smart digital infrastructure is giving rise to a radical new sharing economy that is transforming the way we manage, power and move economic life.

2017 • Economics

22:57

Why do people keep falling for financial scams? Dive into the history of con artists and how technology makes it easier for these schemes to flourish.

S1E1 • Money Explained • 2011 • Economics