Extreme Dinosaurs (BBC Horizon)

Amazing new discoveries in South America are revolutionising what we thought we knew about the dinosaur world. It now seems that South America was home to both the largest meat-eater - so new it's still without a name - and the largest herbivore - the enormous long-necked Argentinasaurus. And what's more, these dinosaurs lived at the same time in the same place. So it's possible that like in a science fiction movie, in this prehistoric world these two giants of their kind fought each other in a spectacular clash of the Titans. This film follows the scientists to Argentina as they unearth one of these giants - a brand new species of dinosaur; the biggest carnivore ever discovered.

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Walking with Dinosaurs
How to Build a Dinosaur

Famous Composers - Richard Wagner

An introduction and overview of the life and works of famed operatic composer Richard Wagner (1813 - 1883). Wagner was a German composer, theatre director, polemicist, and conductor who is primarily known for his operas. Unlike most opera composers, Wagner wrote both the libretto and the music for each of his stage works.

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The Great Composers - Wagner

The Hittites (Documentary narrated by Jeremy Irons)

A documentary about the rise and fall of the Hittite empire, which existed about 3500 years ago in what is now central Turkey. This is the glorious story of the Hittites - the most powerful people in the Near East of their time. Narrated by Jeremy Irons, The Hittites brings the fascinating history of this mighty empire to life with expert interviews, stunning cinematography, dramatic reenactments, and visual effects.

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In Search of the Trojan War

The Inventing Machine: Thomas Edison

Edison is credited for contributing to various inventions, including the phonograph, the kinetoscope, the dictaphone, radio, the electric lamp (in particular the incandescent light bulb), the autographic printer, and the tattoo machine. He also greatly improved the telephone by inventing the carbon microphone. Most of these inventions were not completely original but improvements of earlier inventions. Throughout the 20th century, Edison was the world's most prolific inventor. At the beginning of the century, he held 736 U.S. patents. His final count was 1,093 U.S. patents, including 1084 utility patents (patents for inventions) and 9 artistic design patents. (from wikipedia.org)

Paul Israel, Director and General Editor of The Thomas Edison Papers, shares his insight into the life and work of the world's greatest inventor.

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Thomas Alva Edison

Where Did We Come From? (NOVA scienceNOW)

This film explores the origin of our solar system and the start of life itself, how head lice figure in human evolution, and more. Neil deGrasse Tyson takes us on a journey back in time to the birth of our solar system to examine whether the key to our planet's existence might have been the explosive shockwave of an ancient supernova. Meet a chemist who has yielded a new kind of "recipe" for natural processes to assemble and create the building blocks of life.

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Origins
The Big Question

How the World Wide Web just happened by Tim Berners Lee

Sir Timothy John "Tim" Berners-Lee, also known as "TimBL," is a British computer scientist, best known as the inventor of the World Wide Web. He made a proposal for an information management system in March 1989, and he implemented the first successful communication between a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) client and server via the Internet sometime around mid November.

Tim is a geek. He talks about the importance of being in the right place and the right time. He put together the pieces and made the World Wide Web.

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Nerds 2.0.1: A Brief History of the Internet

Future by Design (Jacque Fresco)

Future by Design shares the life and far-reaching vision of Jacque Fresco, considered by many to be a modern day Da Vinci. Peer to Einstein and Buckminster Fuller, Jacque is a self-taught futurist who describes himself most often as a "generalist" or multi-disciplinarian - a student of many inter-related fields. He is a prolific inventor, having spent his entire life (he is now 90 years old) conceiving of and devising inventions on various scales which entail the use of innovative technology. As a futurist, Jacque is not only a conceptualist and a theoretician, but he is also an engineer and a designer.

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The Genius of Design

A View of Leo Tolstoy’s Life

Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (1828-1910), also known as Leo Tolstoy, was a Russian writer who primarily wrote novels and short stories. Tolstoy was a master of realistic fiction and is widely considered one of the world's greatest novelists. He is best known for two long novels, War and Peace (1869) and Anna Karenina (1877).

This documentary was released in 1967. The film is a remembrance by Tolstoy's youngest daughter Alexandra Lvovna Tolstoy.

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Leo Tolstoy

Cuckoo: Evolutionary Cheat (BBC Natural World)

The sound of the cuckoo is to many the very essence of spring, yet behind the magical call is a bird that is a cheat, a thief and a killer. Just how does the cuckoo trick other birds into accepting its eggs and raising its young? Why don't the duped foster parents react as they watch the baby cuckoo destroy their own eggs and chicks? And why do they work so relentlessly to feed a demanding chick that looks nothing like them and will soon dwarf them?

In this film, new photography is combined with archive footage and the latest scientific findings to solve a puzzle which, as narrator David Attenborough explains, has perplexed nature-watchers for thousands of years.

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The Life of Birds
The Trials of Life

The Life of a Photograph (Sam Abell)

Veteran National Geographic photographer Sam Abell offers a look inside the heart and mind of a master photographer. Sam Abell learned photography from his father at their home in Sylvania, Ohio, where he was born on February 19th, 1945. He graduated in 1969 from the University of Kentucky in Lexington with a B.A. Abell has worked with the National Geographic Society since 1970 and has photographed more than 20 articles on various cultural and wilderness subjects. He has also lectured on photography and exhibited his images to audiences throughout the world.

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The Genius of Photography

Colosseum - A Gladiator’s Story

Dramatized film which uses reconstructions, stunt fights and computer-generated images of ancient Rome to tell the story of Verus, a gladiator who fought in the opening games of the Colosseum in AD 80. The film also tells the story of the Colosseum itself, built to accommodate a staggering 55,000 spectators for the bloody spectacle of gladiatorial combat.

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Ancient Megastructures

Jewels in the Jungle (Angkor Wat)

Jewels in the Jungle concerns the ancient Khmer temples of Cambodia, much of whose history is undocumented. This program examines the unusual mix of Hindu and Buddhist religious figures among the temples and gates built by the Khmer, and examines the walled city of Angkor in some detail. Cambodia's bloody recent history under Pol Pot is also discussed, and the program celebrates the survival of the ancient dances of Angkor, the only remaining cultural link to the distant past.

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Ancient Megastructures

Engineering Secrets of Hagia Sophia

For 1,500 years the dome of Hagia Sophia has soared above the skyline of Istanbul, Turkey. Istanbul is ground zero for massive earthquakes. How does Hagia Sophia continue to survive these killer quakes? Scientists discover the secrets of Hagia Sophia's survival.

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Ancient Megastructures

Hard Problems: The Road to the World’s Toughest Math Contest

Hard Problems is a feature documentary about the extraordinarily gifted students who represented the United States in 2006 at the world's toughest math competition - the International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO). It is the story of six American high school students who competed with 500 others from 90 countries in Ljubljana, Slovenia. The film shows the dedication and perseverance of these remarkably talented students, the rigorous preparation they undertake, their individuality, and the joy they get out of solving challenging problems. Above all, it captures the spirit of math competitions at the highest level.

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A Mathematical Mystery Tour

Super Spider (National Geographic)

Spiders fly, spiders jump more than 40 times their own height, spiders spit to hunt and even they live underwater. With more than 40,000 species recorded, spiders are an indispensable part of any ecosystem. This film digs deep into the often misunderstood world of spiders and discovers how fascinating they really are.

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Monster Bug Wars

Volcano Hell (BBC Horizon)

In 1985 a volcanic eruption in Colombia killed 20,000 people asleep in the town below, leaving the scientific community horrified that they were unable to avert this tragedy by foreseeing extreme volcanic activity in the region. This film follows the subsequent quest of two researchers to find a method of prediction, and reveals how years later, when they thought they had achieved their goal, they clashed over one volcano, leading to the shattering of reputations, but also the solution to the future.

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Volcano Live
Inside the Volcano