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In 1986, the United Way of Cleveland hatched a plan to raise money and set a world record by releasing 1.5 million balloons into the sky. Publicised as an event to redeem Cleveland from bad press and pejorative labels such as ‘The Mistake on the Lake’ following economic struggles and environmental degradation, the event backfired in ways both utterly predictable and entirely unexpected. In this short documentary, the US director Nathan Truesdell uses archival footage to reconstruct the unfolding of the ill-fated ‘Balloonfest 86’, to wry – but not entirely unsympathetic – effect, while hinting at a greater point about the limits of grandiose symbolic gestures.
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Art
The irreverent duo who thumbed their noses at the Soviet Union and the US art world
11 minutes
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Computing and artificial intelligence
A scientist’s poor eyesight helped fuel a revolution in computer ‘vision’
9 minutes
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Ageing and death
Demystifying death – a palliative care specialist’s practical guide to life’s end
4 minutes
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Future of technology
Is this the future of space travel? Take a luxury ‘cruise’ across the solar system
6 minutes
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Fairness and equality
A tragicomic account of how the Los Angeles Police Department blew up a city block
19 minutes
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Stories and literature
A French Creole folktale nearly lost to time is given new, gorgeously animated life
6 minutes
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Computing and artificial intelligence
Struggling to learn how to do a backflip, Nikita takes on an unusual training regimen
12 minutes
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Deep time
When algae met fungi – the hidden story of life’s most successful partnership
4 minutes
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Personality
Why cleaning up crime scenes requires a rare mix of grit and empathy
9 minutes