Project Nim

This jaw-dropping documentary examines the real-life 1970s experiment to teach a chimpanzee, Nim, to communicate through sign language by raising and nurturing him like a human child, without ever considering what would happen when the cute baby grows into a physically strong and single-minded adult. Clashes between scientists and the family who initially take Nim into their home, not to mention a failure to properly catalogue the research, ultimately leaves the ape at the centre of a tug of love, with academics, animal rights campaigners and lawyers fighting over his well-being. Director James Marsh (an Oscar winner for Man on Wire) charts the heartbreaking and often incredible events without ever veering towards mawkish sentimentality. It's as much a story about human folly and arrogance as it is the traumatic journey of an animal being shunted from pillar to post in the name of science.