Project Nim: DVD Review

Project Nim: DVD Review

Rating: M
Released by Warner Home Video

In 1970s Manhattan, a newborn chimp was taken from its mother and deposited in a family home as part of an experiment to see if said chimp can pick up sign language and construct sentences.

Nim was the chimp - and the effects of what happened forms the basis of this engrossing and horrifying documentary from the team who made Man On Wire.

Don't worry, it's not a precursor to Planet of the Apes, more a look at how far we can go sometimes as humans and it's terrifying in many ways.

The doco uses home movie footage and pictures and modern day interviews to construct a well told tale and a journey which will occasionally leave you agog as to what was achieved,what was abandoned and what the cost was to our humanity and those whose lives Nim was part of.

This doco is utterly mesmerizing, heartbreaking and also wondrous in its narrative style- disappointingly and perhaps inevitably though, some questions are left unanswered but what emerges is a tale of betrayal, mistrust, anger and a chimp who changed lives.

Remarkably good.

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