Horizon
Horizon title card
Genre	Science, History, Educational
Starring	Various
Country of origin	United Kingdom
Production
Running time	50 min
Broadcast
Original channel	BBC
Picture format	PAL
Original run	1964 – Present
Links
Official website

Horizon is a long-running BBC popular science and history documentary programme. The format of the series varied in the early years following its launch in 1964 but is now standardised at 50 minutes. Some episodes are adapted from documentaries by other broadcasters such as PBS's NOVA^[1], and episodes of Horizon are in turn adapted by PBS and other broadcasters around the world. Michael Ambrosino, while serving a year-long fellowship with the BBC, was inspired by Horizon and went on to create the long-running NOVA series on the same model ^[2][3] In motion pictures, an intertitle is a piece of filmed, printed text edited into the midst of (i. ... Part of a scientific laboratory at the University of Cologne. ... History studies the past in human terms. ... The British Broadcasting Corporation, usually known as the BBC, is the largest broadcasting corporation in the world in terms of audience numbers, employing 26,000 staff in the United Kingdom alone and with a budget of more than GB£4 billion. ... Television encoding systems by nation PAL, short for Phase Alternating Line, is a colour encoding system used in broadcast television systems in large parts of the world. ... The British Broadcasting Corporation, usually known as the BBC, is the largest broadcasting corporation in the world in terms of audience numbers, employing 26,000 staff in the United Kingdom alone and with a budget of more than GB£4 billion. ... Part of a scientific laboratory at the University of Cologne. ... History studies the past in human terms. ... Documentary film is a broad category of visual expression that is based on the attempt, in one fashion or another, to document reality. ... 1964 (MCMLXIV) was a leap year starting on Wednesday (the link is to a full 1964 calendar). ... Not to be confused with Public Broadcasting Services in Malta. ... Nova is a popular science television series from the USA produced by WGBH and can be seen on PBS and in more than 100 countries. ...

Since the early 1990s, Horizon has developed a distinctive narrative form, typically employing an underlying "detective" metaphor, to relate scientific issues and discoveries to the lives of its viewers. Many episodes of Horizon are structured in a format that starts with a tease or menu laying out what the show has in store, followed by two 'acts' with a 'plot twist' around 25-35 minutes into the show. The twist frequently propels the story line from a focus on an individual scientist's human and intellectual journey of discovery through to explore the impact of that insight while, at the same time, providing a change of 'texture' and filmic pace. Often, episodes of Horizon end up with a montage of "talking heads" as experts and people affected by the implications of the science covered are intercut to create a sense of summary. To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... For other uses of the word montage, see Montage. ...

The down-side to Horizon's focus on 'Pure Science, Sheer Drama' and the occasionally forced narrative this engenders has led to some accusations of dumbing down in recent years^[4][5], with one former editor writing a newspaper article about how the programme concentrates too much on human stories, and not enough on the science.^[6] Dumbing down is a usually derogatory term which refers to the simplifying of a subject, often education, news and TV amongst others. ...

In the period of "Pure Science, Sheer Drama" "Horizon" won an unprecedented series of the world's top awards, including a BAFTA, an Emmy for Best Documentary, a Royal Television Society Award and a Grierson Trust Award. It also enjoyed extremely high viewing figures, even though it covered subjects as complex as molecular biology and particle physics. It has shown a change of direction since June 2006, offering a more light-hearted approach, though the subjects it covers remain serious. The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA), is a British organization that hosts annual awards shows for film, television, childrens film and television, and interactive media. ... An Emmy Award. ... The Royal Television Society is a British-based society for the discussion, analysis and preservation of television in all its forms, past, present and future. ... Molecular biology is the study of biology at a molecular level. ... Thousands of particles explode from the collision point of two relativistic (100 GeV per ion) gold ions in the STAR detector of the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider. ...

References

1. ^ Neal, Stephen, "Re: BBC Alert! 'Horizon' 7th March", Usenet. Comment written 2002-03-08, retrieved 2006-11-04
2. ^ See Ambrosino and Nova: making stories that go ‘bang’, [[Current (newspaper)|]], May 4, 1998
3. ^ "For Curious Grownups" Time magazine, Apr. 29, 1974
4. ^ Orlowski, Andrew, "BBC abandons science", The Register. Article dated 2006-10-27, retrieved 2006-11-04.
5. ^ Various, "BBC Horizon letters", The Register. Published 2006-11-04, retrieved 2006-11-04.
6. ^ Goodchild, Peter, "Clouds on the Horizon", guardian.co.uk. Article written 2004-10-07.

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External links

• BBC's Horizon pages
• Horizon at the Internet Movie Database
• Official episode list (since 1996)
• BBC Catalogue - Horizon
• TV.COM Horizon Guide