The Centrifuge Brain Project

For the past few years I’ve been a judge for the Imagine Science Film Festival. One of my favorites from last year is called The Centrifuge Brain Project; I was so delighted by it that I went hunting for it online to share here. For whatever reason, it didn’t show up until recently. You can now watch it on Vimeo, and I’ve embedded it below.

The Centrifuge Brain Project from Till Nowak on Vimeo.

I have complicated feelings about movies about science. I don’t like movies that come after you with a pedagogical cudgel. To me, the best movies are the ones that take the most liberties with science. I guess I like The Centrifuge Brain Project so much because it toys with science in such a deadpan way–so deadpan that some commenters at Vimeo asked if the crazy amusement park rides were real or not. And yet, in the end, it’s not a simplistic joke, but a short meditation on how we humans try to fight gravity–and nature in general–both in the lab and at amusement parks.

(Mark your calendars–the next Imagine Science Film Festival will be coming to New York this October.)