Philosophy: A Guide to Happiness

We tend to accept that people in authority must be right. It’s this assumption that Socrates wanted us to challenge by urging us to think logically about the nonsense they often come out with, rather than being struck dumb by their aura of importance and air of suave certainty.

This six part series on philosophy is presented by popular British philosopher Alain de Botton, featuring six thinkers who have influenced history, and their ideas about the pursuit of the happy life.

Socrates on Self-Confidence (Part 1) – Why do so many people go along with the crowd and fail to stand up for what they truly believe? Partly because they are too easily swayed by other people’s opinions and partly because they don’t know when to have confidence in their own.

Epicurus on Happiness (Part 2) – British philosopher Alain De Botton discusses the personal implications of the ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus (341-270BCE) who was no epicurean glutton or wanton consumerist, but an advocate of “friends, freedom and thought” as the path to happiness.

Seneca on Anger (Part 3) – Roman philosopher Lucious Annaeus Seneca (4BCE-65CE), the most famous and popular philosopher of his day, took the subject of anger seriously enough to dedicate a whole book to the subject. Seneca refused to see anger as an irrational outburst over which we have no control. Instead he saw it as a philosophical problem and amenable to treatment by philosophical argument.

Montaigne on Self-Esteem (Part 4) – Looks at the problem of self-esteem from the perspective of Michel de Montaigne (16th Century), the French philosopher who singled out three main reasons for feeling bad about oneself – sexual inadequecy, failure to live up to social norms, and intellectual inferiority – and then offered practical solutions for overcoming them.

Schopenhauer on Love (Part 5) – Alain De Botton surveys the 19th Century German thinker Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) who believed that love was the most important thing in life because of its powerful impulse towards ‘the will-to-life’.

Nietzsche on Hardship (Part 6) – British philosopher Alain De Botton explores Friedrich Nietzsche’s (1844-1900) dictum that any worthwhile achievements in life come from the experience of overcoming hardship. For him, any existence that is too comfortable is worthless, as are the twin refugees of drink or religion.

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Taboo: Mating

How far would you go in the name of love? Would you drink your partner’s blood to secure your bond? Or carve their hand print into your flesh to show your devotion?

Could you marry someone behind bars, knowing you may never be able to be together? Or risk your life to steal another man’s wife?

Delve into rituals, ancient and modern, used to bond one human to another and uncover the extremes of human passion and devotion. The desire to find a mate is one of humanity’s fundamental instincts, but what happens to men and women when their love is taboo?

Taboo takes viewers on a journey beyond their comfort zones and across cultural borders to explore addictions and lifestyles that are acceptable in some cultures but forbidden, illegal, or even reviled in others.

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Wild Thing: The Smithsonian National Zoo

Wild Thing: The Smithsonian National Zoo showcases the role of the National Zoo in preserving endangered species on the edge of extinction. The stars of this show – Giant Pandas, Cheetahs, Orangutans, and other animals on display at the Zoo – are “ambassadors” for their dwindling species in the wild.

As part of a worldwide conservation effort, scientists at the National Zoo breed endangered species for the purpose of re-introducing them to nature. The National Zoo is truly a park full of wild animals, but it is also a reminder that humans don’t rule the earth; we share it.

Many of the animals on display are critically endangered in the wild. Some are even extinct in nature and only exist in captivity. Some of the Zoo’s most important challenges involve engaging visitors and reminding them that we are all connected to what goes on out in the wild. Watch below or via SnagFilms or Hulu.

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The Tiger and the Snow

A love-struck poet travels into the heart of wartime Iraq in hopes of rescuing the woman he loves in Academy award-winning director Roberto Benigni's affecting tale of love and devotion.

A kind poet and father to his daughters, a respected lecturer and literary figure to his students, and a complete nuisance in the eyes of his beloved Vittoria (Nicoletta Braschi), Attilio (Benigni) finds his life suddenly turned upside down when he learns that the object of his undying affections has been critically injured in a Baghdad bombing.

Now, despite the chaos sweeping through Iraq, Attilio vows to risk everything in order to travel into the heart of Baghdad and deliver the medicine that will awaken the woman of his dreams from a potentially eternal slumber. Jean Reno and Tom Waits co-star in this heartfelt, serio-comic romance, which pits the uplifting power of love against the destructive force of bombs.

Watch the feature film on Sockshare, Putlocker, NovaMov, GorillaVid, NosVideo, FileBox or UploadC.

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Harold and Maude

Self-destructive and needy but wealthy teenager Harold is obsessed with death and spends his leisure time attending funerals, watching the demolition of buildings, visiting junkyards, simulating suicides trying to get the attention of his indifferent, snobbish and egocentric mother, and having sessions with his psychologist.

When Harold meets the anarchic seventy-nine-year-old Maude at a funeral, they become friends and the old lady discloses other perspectives of the cycle of life for him. Meanwhile, his mother enlists him in a dating service and tries to force him to join the army. On the day of Maude's eightieth birthday, Harold proposes to her but he finds the truth about life at the end of hers.

Watch the trailer below and the film at Veehd or Veoh.

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The Genius of Charles Darwin

The Genius of Charles Darwin is a three-part television documentary, written and presented by evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins.

Life, Darwin and Everything. In the first episode Richard Dawkins explains the basic mechanisms of natural selection, and tells the story of how Charles Darwin developed his theory. He teaches a year 11 science class about evolution, which many of the students are reluctant to accept. He then takes them to the Jurassic Coast in Dorset to search for fossils, hoping that the students can see some of the evidence for themselves.

The Fifth Ape. In the second episode Richard Dawkins deals with some of the philosophical and social ramifications of the theory of evolution. Dawkins starts out in Kenya, speaking with palaeontologist Richard Leakey. He then visits Christ is the Answer Ministries, Kenya’s largest Pentecostal church, to interview Bishop Bonifes Adoyo. Adoyo has led the movement to press the National Museums of Kenya to sideline its collection of hominid bones pointing to man’s evolution from ape to human.

God Strikes Back. In the third and final episode, Dawkins explains why Darwin’s theory is one of history’s most controversial ideas. Dawkins uses this episode to discuss the opposition that evolution has experienced since it was first discovered. He starts by approaching various anti-evolutionists, ranging from John Mackay from Creation Research, Wendy Wright, President of Concerned Women for America, to English school teacher Nick Cowen. In order to address concerns they bring up, he shows the evidence for evolution, including fossil and DNA evidence.

Watch the playlist below or start with episode one. 

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Why Beauty Matters

Philosopher Roger Scruton presents a provocative essay on the importance of beauty in the arts and in our lives.

In the 20th century, Scruton argues, art, architecture and music turned their backs on beauty, making a cult of ugliness and leading us into a spiritual desert.

Using the thoughts of philosophers from Plato to Kant, and by talking to artists Michael Craig-Martin and Alexander Stoddart, Scruton analyses where art went wrong and presents his own impassioned case for restoring beauty to its traditional position at the center of our civilization. Watch below.  

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Fetih 1453

In 1453, the Byzantine capital of Constantinople is surrounded by Ottoman Turks. The city is but a shadow of its former glory due to the empire's ever receding coffers, while the Ottoman Empire continues to grow rich. After years of tolerating the existence of Byzantium, the ambitious sultan, Mehmet II launches his campaign to end the Byzantine Empire and take Constantinople for the Ottomans, resulting in arguably the greatest siege of that age. Watch the trailer below and the film from source one, two or three.

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The Art of Russia

Series in which art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon tells the incredible story of Russian art – its mystery and magnificence – and until now a story untold on British television.

He explores the origins of the Russian icon from its roots in Byzantium and the first great Russian icon, Our Lady of Vladimir to the masterpieces of the country’s most famous icon painter, Andrei Rublev.

Both epic and awe-inspiring, and producing brilliant art, nevertheless medieval Russia could be a terrifying place.

Out of the Forest. Criss-crossing the epic landscape, Andrew visits the monastery founded by Ivan the Terrible, where his favorite forms of torture found inspiration in religious art. One man would shine a light into Russia’s dark ages – Peter the Great who, surprisingly, took as his inspiration Deptford in South London.

Roads to Revolution. He explores how Russia changed from a feudal nation of aristocratic excess to a hotbed of revolution at the beginning of the 20th century and how art moved from being a servant of the state to an agent of its destruction.

Smashing the Mould. The final part examines political revolution and how art was at the forefront of throwing out 1,000 years of royal rule, from its earliest revolutionary days of enthusiasm and optimism when painting died, the poster was king and the machine-made triumphed over the handmade to the dead hand of Socialist Realism.

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First Earth

First Earth: Uncompromising Ecological Architecture

First Earth is a documentary about the movement towards a massive paradigm shift for shelter – building healthy houses in the old ways, out of the very earth itself, and living together like in the old days, by recreating villages.

It is a sprawling film, shot on location from the West Coast to West Africa. An audiovisual manifesto filmed over the course of 4 years and 4 continents, First Earth makes the case that earthen homes are the healthiest housing in the world; and that since it still takes a village to raise a healthy child, it is incumbent upon us to transform our suburban sprawl into eco-villages, a new North American dream.

First Earth is not a how-to film; rather, it’s a why-to film. It establishes the appropriateness of earthen building in every cultural context, under all socio-economic conditions, from third-world communities to first-world countrysides, from Arabian deserts to American urban jungles.

In the age of environmental and economic collapse, peak oil and other converging emergencies, the solution to many of our ills might just be getting back to basics, focusing on food, clothes, and shelter. We need to think differently about house and home, for material and for spiritual reasons, both the personal and the political.

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Róza

Róza: A harrowing tale of survival centers on Rose, a Masurian woman, whose husband, a German soldier, was killed in the war leaving her alone on their farm.

A single woman had no defense against Russian soldiers who raped as a form of revenge, nor against plundering Poles who found themselves in desperate straits. The law of the jungle had replaced the rule of law. Help arrives for Rose in the form of Tadeusz, a former officer in the Polish Home Army who survived the Warsaw uprising and is attempting to hide his identity...

The film opens up on a brutal note instantly - an officer of the Polish Home Army (the dominant Polish resistance movement in German occupied Poland) wakes up on a battlefield, shell-shocked, and he watches as a few German soldiers rape a Polish woman before shooting her in the head.

The war has ended and he travels to East Prussia to hand over some possessions of a Polish man who was in the German Army whose death he had witnessed on the battlefield to his wife. She welcomes him to stay, in order to protect her from the lawless atmosphere of the region on the eve of Soviet take over. This woman has been brutally raped many times; by Red Army soldiers and by her own people, driven mad by war.

Director Wojciech Smarzowski has made a towering achievement here; he is a master of portraying human misery in how he gets close-ups of the characters faces, and he seems to know just where to look in order to the get the best out of the body language of the characters. The acting is authentic and superb, and overall, it is a brilliant film, albeit, some parts of it historically are a bit blurry (I mean, the idea of this man who was in the Warsaw Uprising fighting for his country and returning the possessions of a German soldier to his wife is quite vague) but this film, is a devastating conclusion to the most destructive war in human history.

Watch the trailer below and the film from sources one, two, three, four and five.

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The Fast And The Furious

A prison escapee commandeers a young woman and her hotrod in a mad dash to Mexico! (The exclamation mark may seem gratuitous, but when you're dealing with jailbirds on the run, fast cars, and fast women, the punctuation may as well get some extra gas too.) The Fast and the Furious (1955) was directed by John Ireland (who also starred in the lead role of Frank Webster) and Edwards Sampson (who was also the film editor). Another young man helps out behind the camera too: the fledgling and 28-year-old producer, Roger Corman.

This second-unit direction marked Corman's first experience behind the camera and played a pivotal role in making him realize that he could direct his own films. For The Fast and the Furious Corman made the choice of putting Ireland at the helm as a way of getting the actor to take on the role for considerably less than his usual fee and it also allowed Corman, for the first time, to work with a "name" actor. Corman also gets credit for the story, filled in as a stunt driver, obtained Jaguar racing cars in exchange for product placements, and cribbed racing footage from the Jaguar Open Sports Car race at Monterey.

The Fast and the Furious was shot for $50,000 in nine days and, even though it was only the second film to come out under his full aegis, right after Monster from the Ocean Floor (1954), it has all the DNA of a classic Corman film. It's a simple story, made cheap and on the fly with several niche markets in mind, but it has so much moxie behind the camera that some of it can't help but bust out on the big screen. More importantly, The Fast and the Furious played a strategic and precedent-setting role in allowing Corman to negotiate a multi-picture deal that was pivotal in launching American Releasing Corporation (which soon thereafter changed its name to American International Pictures, or AIP) and it also gave him the financial structure he needed to make more movies. A lot more.

"The Fast and the Furious" - it's a great title, one that grabs your attention. Rob Cohen certainly appreciated the impact of those simple words when he re-used them for his 2001 film starring Vin Diesel and Michelle Rodriguez - but that film is not a remake and only the title rights, not the story rights, were purchased (on the audio-commentary for the DVD, Cohen says he gave Corman stock-footage in exchange for the title). With a fourth installment on the way, the title is certainly getting a lot of mileage.

In the 1955 film we are introduced to Connie Adair (Dorothy Malone), an upper-class blonde who drives her Jaguar along a windy road and takes a break at a diner for an egg salad sandwich and some pineapple juice. She meets a truck driver (Bruno VeSota) and sits at the counter next to a quiet and brooding guy in a leather jacket. As the waitress gets her order conversation is centered on the news reports involving Frank Webster, who was put in jail for intentionally running another truck off the road and killing the driver. As we find out that Webster broke out of jail and is wanted for murder the quiet guy at the counter starts to leave but is stopped when the trucker pulls out a revolver and asks him to show his I.D., resulting in a scuffle that leaves the trucker unconscious and our mystery man in possession of a gun - which he now uses to grab Connie and her car for a trip across the border to Mexico. Yes, he's Webster but, no (as he later tells Connie), he did not murder anybody and has, instead, been set up with no hope of justice.

The story for The Fast and the Furious recycled ideas from the very first film Corman worked on called Highway Dragnet (1954), which he co-wrote and co-produced. It points to a theme that Corman admits "would recur time and again throughout my directing career," because he is "attracted to stories about outcasts, misfits, or antiheroes on the run or on the fringe of society." The character of Frank Webster is certainly all of those things, but the interesting revelation made by the film is that the woman he kidnaps has some things in common with him despite the fact that they appear to be complete opposites. This attractive and independent woman with a jaguar convertible is also an outcast and misfit because, as it turns out, she is barred from the racing circuit she wants to join due to the fact that it won't allow women to participate.

While few people will rush to cite Corman's The Fast and the Furious as a great cinematic example to advance the cause of women's liberation (mainly because Webster treats Connie like luggage throughout most of the film) it does present us with two strong characters that ultimately compliment each another. Webster's insensitive tough-guy persona is easily traced to the kind of no-nonsense roles that people like Humphrey Bogart cut their teeth on and, similarly, Connie's scrappy independence lives under the shadow cast by the likes of Katharine Hepburn. It was a time when even low-budget films destined for a quick-turnaround in marginal markets still catered to adults and didn't think twice about having a hound dog protagonist in his 40's trying to make time with a woman - in-between drag-races and car-chases, of course.

Producer: Roger Corman, Jack Milner
Director: John Ireland, Edwards Sampson
Screenplay: Roger Corman, Jean Howell, Jerome Odlum
Cinematography: Floyd Crosby
Film Editing: Edward Sampson
Music: Alexander Gerens
Cast: John Ireland (Frank Webster), Dorothy Malone (Connie Adair), Bruce Carlisle (Faber), Iris Adrian (Wilma Belding), Marshall Bradford (Mr. Hillman), Bruno VeSota (Bob Nielson).
BW-73m.

Watch below or on YouTube.

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Garbage Warrior

Imagine a home that heats itself, that provides its own water, hat grows its own food. Imagine that it needs no expensive technology, that it recycles its own waste, that it has its own power source. And now imagine that it can be built anywhere, by anyone, out of the things society throws away. Thirty years ago, architect Michael Reynolds imagined just such a home – then set out to build it.

A visionary in the classic American mode, Reynolds has been fighting ever since to bring his concept to the public. He believes that in an age of ecological instability and impending natural disaster, his buildings can – and will – change the way we live. Shot over three years in the USA, India and Mexico, Garbage Warrior is a feature-length documentary film telling the epic story of maverick architect Michael Reynolds, his crew of renegade house builders from New Mexico, and their fight to introduce radically different ways of living.

A snapshot of contemporary geo-politics and an inspirational tale of triumph over bureaucracy, Garbage Warrior is above all an intimate portrait of an extraordinary individual and his dream of changing the world.

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This Is Modern Art

This Is Modern Art was a series written and presented by the English art critic Matthew Collings.

The series won several awards including a BAFTA. It became popular both because of its sometimes jokey and sometimes thoughtful explanations of the work and attitude of a new wave of artists that had recently been publicized in the British mass media, and because of its author’s witty and irreverent, though clearly highly informed, commentary style.

Collings went on to create several more TV series and programmes for Channel 4, including Impressionism: Revenge of The Nice, and This Is Civilisation.

Focuses on the current state of modern art, and looks back at Picasso, Jackson Pollock and Andy Warhol to see how they changed the definition of art. Reveals the ways modern art attempts to shock the audience.

Investigates on whether the once accepted view of art as merely a thing of beauty prevails today, examining the works of various artists. Watch below or here on YouTube.

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D.O.A.

"I want to report a murder...mine." So begins D.O.A.

Told in flashback, the story tells of how vacationing CPA Frank Bigelow (Edmond O'Brien) becomes the recipient of a deadly poison known as iridium. Told by a doctor that he hasn't long to live, Bigelow desperately retraces his movements of the previous 24 hours, trying to locate his murderer.

Through the aid of his secretary Paula Gibson (Pamela Britton) (who doesn't know of her employer's imminent demise), Bigelow traces a shipment of iridium to a gang of criminals who've used the poison in the commission of a crime. But for much of the film, it remains unclear why Bigelow himself was targeted.

Though we know from the outset that Bigelow isn't long for this world, the film builds up an incredible amount of suspense towards the end, when Bigelow is taken "for a ride" by a psychopath (Neville Brand). with a penchant for pummeling his victims in the belly.

Watch below courtesy of The Internet Archive or on YouTube.

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Baltimore: Anatomy of an American City

The election of the first black US president offered hope to millions of African Americans across the country. But have four years of an Obama presidency seen positive change for black communities in the US’ inner cities?

“It’s not a war on drugs, it’s a war on the blacks. It started as war on the blacks and it’s now spread to Hispanics and poor whites. It was designed to take that energy that was coming out of the civil rights movement and destroy it.” – Ed Burns, the co-creator of the TV series The Wire.

While the ‘war on drugs’ rages on inside the US, there is some political consensus it is failing. White House officials have even indicated a federal policy shift away from incarceration and towards a public health strategy.

In Baltimore, one of the most dangerous cities in the US, the police have reframed their ‘war on drugs’ as a ‘war on guns’.

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Gone with the Wind

Scarlett is a woman who can deal with a nation at war, Atlanta burning, the Union Army carrying off everything from her beloved Tara, the carpetbaggers who arrive after the war. Scarlett is beautiful. She has vitality. But Ashley, the man she has wanted for so long, is going to marry his placid cousin, Melanie.

Mammy warns Scarlett to behave herself at the party at Twelve Oaks. There is a new man there that day, the day the Civil War begins. Rhett Butler. Scarlett does not know he is in the room when she pleads with Ashley to choose her instead of Melanie...

The film stars Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh in the tiles roles with Leslie Howard. Hattie McDaniel and Olivia de Havilland. Watch the trailer below and the film from sources one, two, three or four.

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Impressionism: Revenge of the Nice

Matthew Collings has a wonderfully simple and funny way of making you understand the when, where, why and how of important is art so this programme will get your head around impressionism in a couple of hours.

Matthew Collings will reappraise the Impressionists. The four stars are Courbet, Manet, Monet and Cezanne. In two hours their stories and their art will intertwine. Matt will unpack the principles of Impressionism – the strength of color, the flatness, the patterning and the way in which ordinary life is pictured with startling truth – and argue that this is the best thing that has ever happened in modern art.

He will also show that although the contemporary art world seemingly despises Impressionism it is only because of Impressionism that the avant-garde came to be.

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The Fabric of the Cosmos

The Fabric of the Cosmos, a four-hour series based on the book by renowned physicist and author Brian Greene, takes us to the frontiers of physics to see how scientists are piecing together the most complete picture yet of space, time, and the universe.

With each step, audiences will discover that just beneath the surface of our everyday experience lies a world we’d hardly recognize – a startling world far stranger and more wondrous than anyone expected.

Brian Greene is going to let you in on a secret: We’ve all been deceived. Our perceptions of time and space have led us astray.

Much of what we thought we knew about our universe – that the past has already happened and the future is yet to be, that space is just an empty void, that our universe is the only universe that exists – just might be wrong.

Interweaving provocative theories, experiments, and stories with crystal-clear explanations and imaginative metaphors like those that defined the groundbreaking and highly acclaimed series The Elegant Universe, The Fabric of the Cosmos aims to be the most compelling, visual, and comprehensive picture of modern physics ever seen on television.

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His Girl Friday

Hilarious romantic comedy starring Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell. Russell is rough and tumble reporter looking to get out of the news racket by marrying and becoming a house wife after her divorce from newspaper publisher Grant. Just when she is about to leave town with her husband-to-be the still lovesick Grant drafts her to cover one final breaking news sensation. Along with plenty of laughs and fast paced dialog this film provides a witty and cynical look at news business.

Editor's Note: There is a slight audio sync problem in the first couple minutes of the film. It is present on the source medium and is very brief.

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The Elegant Universe

Adapted from a provocative book by Brian Greene, this deeply engrossing documentary — which originally aired on PBS’s NOVA in three parts — attempts to explain the controversial string theory, a complicated scientific proposal that, in short, posits a single explanation for many of the universe’s mysteries.

As affable an egghead as you’re likely to find, Greene engages an array of physicists in his examination of string theory, which in part blends Einstein’s theory of relativity with the complex laws governing quantum mechanics. Although mind-numbing technical terms are kept to a minimum, those of us not conversant with advanced physics might feel a bit lost at times.

Still, the subject is undeniably fascinating, and some of the conclusions are nothing short of mind-blowing: a reasoned, professional discussion of a universe encompassing 11 separate dimensions certainly calls Johnny Carson’s “I did not know that” to mind.

In some ways reminiscent of Carl Sagan’s Cosmos series, The Elegant Universe is even tougher to get a handle on. But the effort will prove rewarding, especially when you’re looking for a way to melt the ice at cocktail parties.

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Mrs Peppercorn's Magical Reading Room

Mrs Peppercorn's Magical Reading Room

Eloise moves to Black Lake, a remote Cornish fishing village. Whilst there she discovers her life isn't quite what she thought it was...

A magical/fantasy short film set in a remote cornish fishing village. Eloise a nine year old adopted girl takes solace in her books when she moves to the creepy village of Black Lake, until she meets Mrs Peppercorn the bookshop owner who was said to have been dead for over nine years.

Watch on Vimeo, YouTube or UploadC.
Watch below on YouTube.

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Cosmos: A Personal Voyage

With Cosmos, Carl Sagan and his wife and co-writer, Ann Druyan, brilliantly illustrated the underlying science of his same-titled book, placing the human species within a space-and-time context that brought the infinite into stunningly clear view. The series, which originally aired in 1980 on PBS, has been seen by more than 700 million people worldwide and remains a high-water mark in miniseries history.

Sagan lucidly explains such topics as Einstein’s theory of relativity, Darwin’s theory of evolution, and the greenhouse effect, bringing the mysteries of the universe down to a layman’s level of understanding. The footage in these remastered, seven-DVD or seven-VHS sets is as fresh and riveting as it was two decades ago and is certain to fire the imaginations of a whole new generation of viewers. This is THE GREATEST television series ever.

This documentary inspired me to a love of science, learning, and freedom of inquiry that have shaped both my interests and intellectual curiosity. Of the hundreds of high-quality science doc series released in the interim, none approach the majesty and depth of this one. An elegant and artistic enterprise for a well-organized, self-correcting way of reasoning and thinking about the universe/time we occupy. After a quarter of a century, this series is as captivating as it is an education.

Watch the thirteen episode playlist below, or choose an episode here.

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Killer Cloud

In 1783, thousands in Britain died as a result of an environmental disaster, choking on poisonous gases from a huge volcanic eruption in Iceland.

The ensuing winter was one of the harshest ever recorded and claimed even more lives. This forgotten disaster has remained a mystery for the past 200 years.

‘Timewatch’ reveals the evidence and reviews the likelihood of a repetition.

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The Story of Science: Power, Proof and Passion

For thousands of years we have wrestled with the great questions of existence. Who are we? What is the world made of? How did we get here? The quest to answer these is the story of science.

Each week, medical journalist Michael Mosley traces the often unpredictable path we have taken. From recreating a famous alchemist’s experiment, to following in Galileo’s footsteps, and putting himself in the hands of a hypnotist, Michael unpicks how science has changed the way we see ourselves, and the way we see our world.

It is a tale of courage and of fear, of hope and disaster, of persistence and success. It interweaves great forces of history – revolutions, voyages of discovery and artistic movements – with practical, ingenious inventions and the dogged determination of experimenters and scientists.

This is the story of how history made science and how science made history, and how the ideas which emerged made the modern world.

1. What Is Out There? How we came to understand our planet was not at the center of everything in the cosmos.

2. What Is The World Made Of? How atomic theories and concepts of quantum physics underpin modern technology.

3. How Did We Get Here? Michael Mosley tells how scientists came to explain the diversity of life on earth.

4. Can We Have Unlimited Power? The story of how power has been harnessed from wind, steam and from inside the atom.

5. What is the Secret of Life? Michael Moseley tells the story of how the secret of life has been unraveled through the prism of the most complex organism known – the human body.

6. Who Are We? The twin sciences of brain anatomy and psychology have offered different visions of who we are. Now these sciences are coming together and in the process have revealed some surprising and uncomfortable truths about what really shapes our thoughts, feelings and desires.

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The Bride

In this update of James Whale's classic The Bride of Frankenstein, pop star Sting furthers his burgeoning film career by portraying cinema's signature mad scientist. Disgusted by his dim-witted and ugly original creation (Clancy Brown), Dr. Frankenstein sets out to animate an improved version. Though lovely on the outside, Eva (Jennifer Beals) begins her new life as little more than an animal. With the help of his trusty housekeeper (Geraldine Page), however, Frankenstein soon grooms the beautiful zombie into a reasonable facsimile of an upper-class debutante. He's unprepared, however, when his ward displays a mind -- and sexual urges -- of her own.

Meanwhile, the good doctor's discarded original creation assumes the name of Viktor and takes to the road. Befriended by an enterprising dwarf named Rinaldo (David Rappaport), Viktor becomes a circus performer but continues to pine after his bride. Connected to her psychically, he soon makes his way back to the scene of their mutual creation. There, he finds the girl embroiled in a love triangle between a callow suitor (Cary Elwes) and Frankenstein himself. In addition to its iconic '80s leads, The Bride boasts a famous supporting cast that includes gay memoirist Quentin Crisp and '60s model Veruschka. Watch on Putlocker, UploadC, Sockshare, Zalaa or Novamov.

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Through the Wormhole

Hosted by Morgan Freeman, Through the Wormhole will explore the deepest mysteries of existence – the questions that have puzzled mankind for eternity. What are we made of? What was there before the beginning? Are we really alone? Is there a creator? These questions have been pondered by the most exquisite minds of the human race.

Now, science has evolved to the point where hard facts and evidence may be able to provide us with answers instead of philosophical theories. Through the Wormhole will bring together the brightest minds and best ideas from the very edges of science – Astrophysics, Astrobiology, Quantum Mechanics, String Theory, and more – to reveal the extraordinary truth of our Universe. 

To watch an episode, just click the link.

Season 1

Is There A Creator? It’s perhaps the biggest, most controversial mystery in the cosmos. Did our Universe just come into being by random chance, or was it created by a God who nurtures and sustains all life? The latest science is showing that the four forces governing our universe are phenomenally…

The Riddle of Black Holes. They are the most powerful objects in the universe. Nothing, not even light, can escape the gravitational pull of a black hole. Astronomers now believe there are billions of them out in the cosmos, swallowing up planets, even entire stars in violent feeding frenzies…

Is Time Travel Possible? Einstein’s Theory of Relativity says that time travel is perfectly possible — if you’re going forward. Finding a way to travel backwards requires breaking the speed of light, which so far seems impossible. But now, strange-but-true phenomena such as quantum…

What Happened Before the Beginning? Every cosmologist and astronomer agrees: our Universe is 13.7 billion years old. Using cutting-edge technology, scientists are now able to take a snapshot of the Universe a mere heartbeat after its birth. Armed with hypersensitive satellites, astronomers look…

How Did We Get Here? Everywhere we look, life exists in both the most hospitable of environments and in the most extreme. Yet we have only ever found life on our planet. How did the stuff of stars come together to create life as we know it? What do we really mean by ‘life’? And will unlocking…

Are We Alone? Aliens almost certainly do exist. So why haven’t we yet met E.T.? It turns out we’re only just developing instruments powerful enough to scan for them, and science sophisticated enough to know where to look. As a result, race is on to find the first intelligent aliens. But what would they…

What Are We Made Of? Our understanding of the universe and the nature of reality itself has drastically changed over the last 100 years, and it’s on the verge of another seismic shift. In a 17-mile-long tunnel buried 570 feet beneath the Franco-Swiss border, the world’s largest and most powerful…

Beyond The Darkness. What is the universe made of? If you answered stars, planets, gas and dust, you’d be dead wrong. Thirty years ago, scientists first realized that some unknown dark substance was affecting the way galaxies moved. Today, they think there must be five times as much dark matter…

Season 2

Is there Life after Death? In the premiere episode of the second season of Through the Wormhole, Morgan Freeman dives deep into this provocative question that has mystified humans since the beginning of time. Modern physics and neuroscience are venturing into this once hallowed ground…

Is There an Edge to the Universe? It is commonly theorized that the universe began with the Big Bang 13.7 billion years ago. But since we can only see as far as light has traveled in that time, we can’t actually make out the edge of the universe. Could it be that the universe is infinite…

Does Time Exist? When you’re having fun, time flies. Waiting in a traffic jam, not so much. Your birthday was last month, and your mortgage payment is due in a few days. The fact that we perceive time is certainly no illusion. But is it really there, or is it something we invented…

Are There More Than Three Dimensions? For most of our history, we’ve rested easy in the notion that there were three dimensions that have existed throughout time: length, width and height. Ah, the good old days. In the early 20th century, Hermann Minkowski and Albert Einstein connected…

Is there a Sixth Sense? Sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch are the tools most of us depend on to perceive the world. But some people say they also can perceive things that are outside the range of the conventional senses, through some other channel for which there is no anatomical or…

Are There Parallel Universes? Since the ancient Greeks first speculated that everything they observed in reality was the result of the interaction of tiny particles they called atoms, great thinkers have tried to find a single mathematical formula that governs and explains the workings of…

How Does the Universe Work? With the help of massive machines called particle accelerators, scientists studied the subatomic realm and made discoveries about the forces that operate at that level. But the search for a comprehensive explanation still continues. In particular, physicists…

Can We Travel Faster Than Light? Prior to the day in 1947 when test pilot Charles E. Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier for the first time, people argued it wasn’t possible for a plane to fly that fast. So, perhaps we shouldn’t be deterred by the part of Einstein’s special theory of relativity…

Can We Live Forever? Medical advances have doubled human life expectancy in past centuries. But can humans ever beat death altogether? Can we control and fix the errors that build up in our DNA over the years? Can we find a way to replace the chemistry of life with something more durable…

What Do Aliens Look Like? Science fiction writers have always had their little green men. But these humanoid aliens were based soundly on Earth-based life, not any extra terrestrial evidence. Today, we’ve discovered hundreds of planets around other stars. As we learn what some of these alternative…

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