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Black Holes: The Edge of All We Know

Play trailer 1:27 Poster for Black Holes: The Edge of All We Know 2020 1h 39m Documentary Play Trailer Watchlist
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100% Tomatometer 7 Reviews 79% Popcornmeter Fewer than 50 Ratings
What can black holes teach us about the boundaries of knowledge? These holes in spacetime are the darkest objects and the brightest--the simplest and the most complex. With unprecedented access, Black Holes | The Edge of All We Know follows two powerhouse collaborations. Stephen Hawking anchors one, striving to show that black holes do not annihilate the past. Another group, working in the world's highest altitude observatories, creates an earth-sized telescope to capture the first-ever image of a black hole. Interwoven with other dimensions of exploring black holes, these stories bring us to the pinnacle of humanity's quest to understand the universe.

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Black Holes: The Edge of All We Know

Critics Reviews

View All (7) Critics Reviews
Tim Cogshell FilmWeek (KPCC - NPR Los Angeles) I love this movie. It's fantastic. Mar 10, 2021 Full Review Phil Guie Film-Forward.com Though the film is full of jargon that may fly over viewers’ heads, it remains accessible and easy to follow, thanks to how the filmmakers and subjects eschew explaining complicated mathematical formulas or scientific theories. Rated: 4/5 Sep 25, 2022 Full Review Graeme Tuckett Stuff.co.nz About the staggering things that human beings can achieve when we put aside their differences and work together for a common go. Jun 17, 2021 Full Review JK Sooja Common Sense Media Very watchable, Black Holes: The Edge of All We Know doesn't try to explain too much. Rated: 4/5 May 5, 2021 Full Review Jennie Kermode Eye for Film The resulting documentary doesn't score on all levels, but it's a bold attempt to help important work reach a wider audience, and it's a valuable contribution to recorded history. Rated: 3.5/5 Mar 19, 2021 Full Review Christopher Llewellyn Reed Film Festival Today The movie does a wonderful job showcasing scientists at work ...and a diverse bunch of scientists at that. Rated: 3/4 Mar 8, 2021 Full Review Read all reviews

Audience Reviews

View All (5) audience reviews
michal d It's and incredibly boring documentary about incredibly interesting topics and people. Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars 03/30/23 Full Review Audience Member Interesting documentary showing both the theoretical and experimental efforts of scientists to learn more about black holes. The content of the documentary was very much over my head, but presented in an accessible enough way. Good documentary of you are interested in astronomy and black holes. Rated 3 out of 5 stars 01/15/23 Full Review Audience Member It was so real, yet we never actually see it. A documentary about two separate stories: one about solving black hole's information paradox and the other about the recent and first-ever capture of the black hole. This took me back to my high school year where I was fascinated with theoretical physics and astronomy. Cruising the Crash Course Astronomy playlist and learning the elementary particles chart were good times. Funny enough, I even wanted to become a theoretical physicist in the future. Of course, this was all before taking my AP Physics 1 class. About the two separate stories, I'm not gonna lie, I had no idea what the group of theoretical physicists were discussing about in the information paradox story. An interesting aspect was that these physicists were long-time partners with Stephen Hawking, so I was able to see a little bit of their interaction with the great one, including his recent death. Overall, it still was a weak part of the movie. The other story was significantly more fascinating. The news of the first real picture of black hole was very popular and impactful not only to the scientific community, but also to the general public as well. The famous picture of Katie Bouman was one that many saw. However, what wasn't widely know to people, including me, was how much effort and time it actually took to finally get that fuzzy circle. And the documentary did a great job of showing the journey of the team at the Event Horizon Telescope. It surely felt good seeing everything come together for them. The visuals were also cool. There were many simulations of how black holes worked, and the one at the University of Nottingham was the most fascinating. Also, the visual showing the distance between Earth and the targeted supermassive black hole was pleasing and surprising to watch. It reminds me of seeing those cool videos about the comparable sizes of stars and galaxies on YouTube. Overall, a great documentary of one of the most important events in the scientific community. 8/10 Rated 4 out of 5 stars 02/06/23 Full Review Audience Member Peter Galison does an excellent job of keeping the science high along with the interest in this well crafted documentary. He focuses on the personalities, passions, and physics of cutting edge black hole science. Devoid of dumbed down analogies and over-simplicity of the subject, the film gives us hope that there are still creators out there that can push the boundaries. It's a rare bird. Rated 5 out of 5 stars 02/03/23 Full Review Audience Member I am very much the target audience for this movie but I have to say that this was incredibly dull and leaned way too much on "Hey look, Stephen Hawking is in our movie." Much better space docs out there.... you can pass on this one Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars 01/26/23 Full Review Read all reviews
Black Holes: The Edge of All We Know

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Movie Info

Synopsis What can black holes teach us about the boundaries of knowledge? These holes in spacetime are the darkest objects and the brightest--the simplest and the most complex. With unprecedented access, Black Holes | The Edge of All We Know follows two powerhouse collaborations. Stephen Hawking anchors one, striving to show that black holes do not annihilate the past. Another group, working in the world's highest altitude observatories, creates an earth-sized telescope to capture the first-ever image of a black hole. Interwoven with other dimensions of exploring black holes, these stories bring us to the pinnacle of humanity's quest to understand the universe.
Director
Peter Galison
Producer
Peter Galison
Production Co
Collapsar, Sandbox Films
Genre
Documentary
Original Language
English
Release Date (Streaming)
Feb 8, 2021
Runtime
1h 39m
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