Part 1 • 2019 • episode "S1E1" • Looking for Rembrandt

47:02

Salvador Magluta and Augusto Falcon are indicted by a grand jury in April 1991 on a variety of crimes. However, after a lengthy trial, Judge Federico Moreno found the two accused not guilty. In the wake of a stunning verdict, questions arise about the jury's credibility, and a subsequent investigation into Magluta and Falcon's finances reveals that they bribed several senior judges, and one juror in particular soon adopts a very creative legal defense.

S1E4 • Cocaine Cowboys: The Kings of Miami • 2021 • People

42:38

Driven by an all-consuming desire for power, Jamaica's Christopher Coke considers himself a modern-day Robin Hood -- until authorities take him down.

S2E3 • Drug Lords • 2018 • People

43:03

On January 1947, Al Capone, the most notorious gangster in America is dead at the age of 48. After serving ten years prison sentence Paul Ricca takes his place alongside Tony Accardo as co-head of The Outfit, which is making more money than before thanks to the numbers racket. In order to hide their profits, the answer is a growing city in the middle of the Mojave Desert where gambling is legal—Las Vegas, Nevada. But for the mafia from Chicago it is difficult to get into the gambling paradise of Las Vegas, because the New York mafia is already there. But it turns out to be a well-organized partnership. The leadership around Tony Accardo expands rapidly and finances the construction of new casinos in the city. The money for this is provided, among others, by the boss of one of the country's largest unions, Jimmy Hoffa. But the connection flies.

S1E7 • The Making of the Mob: Chicago • 2016 • People

58:58

According to the UN, it is predicted that the human population could reach ten billion people by the year 2050. For broadcaster and naturalist Chris Packham, who has dedicated his life to championing the natural world, the subject of our growing population and the impact it is having on our planet is one of the most vital – and often overlooked – topics of discussion in an era of increasing environmental awareness. Chris is worried that a world of ten billion may simply be too many people for the earth to sustain, given the impact 7.7 billion humans are already having. Travelling around the globe in search of answers to difficult and sometimes controversial questions, Chris investigates why our population is growing so rapidly, what impact it is having on the natural world, and whether there is anything that can be done. Chris travels to Brazil to discover a megacity on the verge of running out of water and an industry expanding to feed our growing numbers – with dire consequences for biodiversity. In Nigeria, a country set to become the third most populous nation on earth by 2050, overtaking the United States, Chris visits an extraordinary community surviving against the odds and a school that might hold the answer to a future fall in the birth rate. Back home in Britain, Chris interviews Sir David Attenborough – like Chris, he is a patron of the charity Population Matters. Chris also examines the role of falling birth rates around the world, the impact of an aging population, and meets a couple who are struggling to get pregnant through IVF. With interviews from several population experts, Chris's focus ultimately turns to the impact our levels of consumption are already having, and asks whether the world can rebalance to accommodate the needs of over two billion more people.

Horizon • 2020 • People

53:07

The first world power goes to war against drugs: the United States strikes hard. But the drug trade never dies. It moves, transforms, adapts. As the war on drugs progresses around the world, a new generation of drug lords emerged at the end of the 1970s, more powerful than ever. These criminals were not only in it for the money; they also wanted power. Pablo Escobar was the most notorious, but there was also Toto Riina in Sicily, Khun Sa in the Golden Triangle, and Felix Gallardo in Mexico, all of whom changed the destinies of their respective territories by taking drug trafficking to a global scale. They defied states and threatened the powers-that-be. It took almost 20 years for states to get organized and come up with strategies to bring down the drug barons.

S1E2 • The Story of Drug Trafficking • 2020 • People

76:42

Marco Polo: World's Greatest Overland Explorer? Or World's Biggest Liar? Perhaps no land journey in human history is more famous than Marco Polo's legendary 24 year trek across Asia. But was it all just a big lie? As described in his 1299 book, the peripatetic Venetian merchant encountered such wonders as the "singing sand dunes" of Dunhuang, China, "mountains of salt" in present-day Afghanistan, and the glories of the Mongol court of Kublai Khan. Generations of Europeans were spellbound by Polo's account, yet in recent years some scholars have questioned its authenticity. National Geographic Photographer Mike Yamashita sets out to visually document one of the greatest overland journeys ever made: the 24-year odyssey of Marco Polo. 700 years ago a young Venetian set out on what was to become one of the most influential journeys ever made. His adventures took him well beyond the boundaries of the known world of Persia to a land that was almost completely unexplored - the mysterious Middle Kingdom. But ever since he returned there were those who doubted Marco Polo. Did he really see what he described in his legendary book, 'Description of the World' or did he merely describe what others told him. In this film, Mike Yamashita follows Marco's book from the lofty heights of the Pamir Mountains to the fabled city of Xanadu in Mongolia. In so doing he attempts to unravel some of the age old mystery: Did Marco Polo really go to China? In the course of this incredible journey Mike stumbles onto a nomadic Kazak wedding in Aksai and investigates the controversy of the Great Wall - why did Polo never mention this in his famous travelogue "The Description of the World"? And why did he never mention tea or chopsticks? Yamashita talks to noted Chinese historian Professor Liu Yingsheng about these and many other Polo conundrums. In Yunnan province, he visits the bound feet women, and travels to inner Mongolia to film the famous herds of the Mongolian horsemen. As Yamashita reaches Xanadu he ponders on how Polo became a trusted confidant to the Khan and spent 17 years in his service. What sights he must have seen. But did he? The mystery slowly but surely reveals itself.

2022 • People