The Story of 1
★ 7.7 · 2005 · 60m · Documentary
A humor-inflected history of the of the number one, covering military applications in ancient Rome, the measurement of distances in India, and the decimal system created by Leibnitz.
More Like This

The cats, the sea, and everything in between.
2025
In 2022, when the economic crisis in her native country was at its peak, she decided to visit her family there. She turned her short trip into a collage-like diary in which she reflects on her relationship with her homeland, which is in a state of protracted decay. The film is composed of spontaneous snapshots capturing the author's stay, interspersed with inserted captions serving as personal, often poetically formulated comments and observations. As a result, the film does not hide its strongly subjective perspective, but at the same time builds on it to make an important statement that shows the transformation of Lebanese society in everyday details such as the appearance of the city itself or in the intimate sphere of the author's family life.
More info →
Beautiful Young Minds
2007 · ★ 6.9
This BAFTA nominated documentary tells the story of some of the brightest mathematical brains of a generation. Each year, exceptionally gifted teenagers from over 90 countries compete for medals at the International Mathematical Olympiad. The film follows a group of brilliant teenagers as they battle it out to become the chosen six selected to represent the UK.
More info →
West of the Jordan River
2018 · ★ 5.6
Amos Gitai returns to the occupied territories for the first time since his 1982 documentary FIELD DIARY. WEST OF THE JORDAN RIVER describes the efforts of citizens, Israelis and Palestinians, who are trying to overcome the consequences of occupation. Gitai's film shows the human ties woven by the military, human rights activists, journalists, mourning mothers and even Jewish settlers. Faced with the failure of politics to solve the occupation issue, these men and women rise and act in the name of their civic consciousness. This human energy is a proposal for long overdue change.
More info →
Clouds Are Not Spheres
2010 · ★ 7.7
Until recently geometry was 'cold', incapable of describing the irregular shape of a cloud, the slope of a mountain or the beauty of the human body. With fractal geometry, Benoit Mandelbrot gave us a language for our natural world. In this captivating documentary, the man himself explains this groundbreaking discovery.
More info →
Magic Money: The Bitcoin Revolution
2017 · ★ 7.5
What is Bitcoin? With the advent of Bitcoin, the world's first digital currency, for the first time in history money is no longer controlled by banks or governments, but by the people who use it. But where did this currency come from? How does it work? And is it truly the way forward, or just a flash in the pan? Magic Money answers these questions and more as it explores the mysterious origins of Bitcoin, its role in society, and how it could shape the future.
More info →

A State of Passion
2024
A feature-length documentary film by Carol Mansour and Muna Khalidi. After 43 horrific days working round the clock under constant bombardment in the emergency rooms of Gaza’s Al Shifa and Al Ahli hospitals, British-Palestinian reconstructive surgeon, Dr. Ghassan Abu Sittah, emerged to find himself as a face of Palestinian resistance.
More info →
BASHLA
2024
Bashla tells the story of Naeem, a Turkmen man who moves to Tehran but returns to his village. Struggling between tradition and modernity, he becomes an advocate for preserving his people’s heritage.
More info →
Metamorphose: M.C. Escher, 1898-1972
1999 · ★ 7
A documentary about the life and works of the artist M. C. Escher. Maurits Cornelis Escher (1898-1972) usually referred to as M. C. Escher, was a Dutch graphic artist. He is known for his often mathematically inspired woodcuts, lithographs, and mezzotints. These feature impossible constructions, explorations of infinity, architecture, and tessellations.
More info →Theory of Sets
1991 · ★ 5.8
Made entirely on Roger Wagner's HyperStudio software, Chris Marker explores set theory, using Noah's Ark as an example.
More info →
The Most Brilliant Human Mind - John von Neumann
2024 · ★ 6
John von Neumann, one of the most incredible Hungarian-born scientists of all time, was named Man of the Century by the Financial Times in 1999. Among other scientific works, Neumann pioneered game theory and, along with Alan Turing and Claude Shannon, was one of the conceptual inventors of the stored-program digital computer. In late 1943 Neumann began to work on the Manhattan Project at the invitation of J. Robert Oppenheimer, and helped to design the first atomic bomb. This biography showcases the famous mathematician's work and legacy from the perspective of his daughter and colleagues. It is based on artefacts and documents from scientific history collections and on the personal memories of Marina von Neumann Whitman, Neumann's daughter. The film's production team has been filming all around the world, from Budapest to Los Alamos and Princeton, with the participation of several Hungarian and American scientists.
More info →
Secrets & Deals
2022
In 1971, Bahrain, Qatar and the UAE ceased to be part of Britain’s empire in the Middle East and became fully independent states. BBC News Persia and BBC Arabic collaborate in this gripping film, to uncover the secrets and shady deals that underpinned the decolonization process. From eye-witness accounts of a British-organised coup to Iran being left in control of disputed islands, it's a fascinating insight to a murky history.
More info →