Social & External
Is there any way to slow or even prevent the ravages of time? Veteran presenter Johnny Ball looks back over the 45 years that Horizon, and he, have been on air to find out what science has learned about how and why we grow old. Charting developments from macabre early claims of rejuvenation to the latest cutting-edge breakthroughs, Johnny discovers the sense of a personal mission that drives many scientists and asks whether we are really any closer to achieving the dream of immortality.
A team of volunteer doctors and nurses are on board a unique ship. Crammed with medical supplies and volunteer medics, this floating hospital sails to the poorest nations on earth. This year they sail for Guinea on the West African Coast. On arrival they will face the most severe of medical issues, not seen in other parts of the world. But the medical challenges are only half of the story. They will confront ethical decisions as they decide who will be helped and who will not. This is a searing, complex journey for the volunteer medics, as they deal with life and death cases - and balance the fates of these patients in their hands.
Danusia and her daughter Basia live far away from the modern world, in tune with the rhythm and laws of nature, among animals and the spirits of the dead. The peace and sense of security offered by their enclave come at a price - the women increasingly long for contact with other people. Bucolic is an affectionate observation of people who live in a different way. It evokes a curiosity about their world and a desire to take a closer look.
A cellar. A forgotten amphora. The ashes of a woman. Her granddaughter, daughter-in-law and son characterise her, entwining their memories and experiences. They reflect about filial love, gender and isolation through her overbearing nature.
A documentary about faith through an essay on aging and the fear of death. A story about a group of elders in a ghost town and their lifetime struggle for the respect of their culture and their different ways of understanding faith, where the need of water is the main element that supports their demands and ancient culture is presented as an heritage for new generations to come, that if their home town survives after they are gone. A film that portrays youthfulness as hope, while the main characters reminds us all that nothing is more powerful than our own will and that there is no such thing as a lost cause.
Every single day of 2022 represented by one single uncut, unedited shot. The result: the year in moments.
Made in Japan, Last Room is both fiction and documentary. The occupants of the love-hotels and capsule-hotels tell their own intimate, dreamlike stories, interspersed with journeys through the archipelago's landscapes. Soon, these personal stories resonate with a collective history: that of Gunkanjima, the abandoned ghost island of Nagasaki, and then that of Japan as a whole.
A short documentary examining the consequence of time within the fragility of memory, exposing a sense of self, trapped within materiality and fantasy. We observe Chrystalla in her safe place, her home, reflecting on her childhood, her successful beauty business in 70s Cyprus and her deeply troubled marriage. Loneliness, abandonment and regret are prevailing themes within cycles of reflection, jest and contradiction.
Everyone in town knows Simón's story, because like a rumor or an urban legend, it has been spreading among its inhabitants, the few who believe him and those who question everything about his story... But Simón will clear up doubts, recounting what happened during those supernatural events...
Fernando is an actor and theater teacher who, at the age of 74, is impelled to be the protagonist of himself in an experience that blurs the boundaries between the documentary and the fictional. Faced with a delicate problem in his heart, he follows a life full of love for art, where education emerges as a powerful transforming element of reality.
For over 80 years, Merle Hayden has crusaded to recruit members to the utopian movement Lawsonomy. Founded by aircraft pioneer Alfred Lawson, Lawsonomy advocates for economic reform and clean, communal living that transforms followers into a "New Species" that will benefit the human race either in this life or the next. Merle joined Lawson as a teenager and never looked back. His high school sweetheart Betty Kasch, however, is tired of Lawson coming between them. Reunited after over 60 years apart, non-believer Betty wants Merle to join her in Florida. Merle's commitment to preserving Lawson's legacy, artifacts currently rotting in a barn alongside a Wisconsin highway, has Betty worried Merle may leave her for Lawson once again.
Shot over the course of 18 months in New York City's Lower East Side, METHADONIA sheds light on the inherent flaws of legal methadone treatments for heroin addiction by profiling eight addicts, in various stages of recovery and relapse, who attend the New York Center for Addiction Treatment Services (NYCATS).
Like ghosts, the temporarily shut down cruise ships lie in the port of Hamburg. A young man comes into town and is stranded on the riverbank, waiting for a message. He watches couples strolling along in the sunset and gets himself some sweets. In a moment of collective pause, ISLANDS IN THE CITY captures a fragile romance. There is a departure in the air, the destination of which no one seems to know.
After the recent loss of his wife Angèle, grandpa René tries to stay positive, finding comfort in simple joys like his cacti and cat Musti—but the weight of impermanence lingers.
A Texan begins a cross-country journey in hope of finding the empty loft she keeps seeing in visions.
At 88 years old, Ofelia reflects on her life under the attentive gaze of her grandchildren. Family, love, disputes, adventures, and tragedies. A story brimming with characters that, as a result of the passing of time, leaves Ofelia as the sole witness to recount it
In a decaying Soviet-era retirement home, a vibrant group of elders cling to life by staging Shakespeare. Yet loneliness lingers beyond the theater’s doors, until drama begins to blur with reality.
