''Particle Fever'' is a 2013 American
documentary film
A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a historical record". Bill Nichols has characterized the documentary in te ...
tracking the first round of experiments at the
Large Hadron Collider
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world's largest and highest-energy particle collider. It was built by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) between 1998 and 2008 in collaboration with over 10,000 scientists and hundr ...
(LHC) near
Geneva
Geneva ( ; french: Genève ) frp, Genèva ; german: link=no, Genf ; it, Ginevra ; rm, Genevra is the second-most populous city in Switzerland (after Zürich) and the most populous city of Romandy, the French-speaking part of Switzerland. Situa ...
,
Switzerland
). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...
. The film follows the
experimental physicists
An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs when ...
at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (
CERN
The European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN (; ; ), is an intergovernmental organization that operates the largest particle physics laboratory in the world. Established in 1954, it is based in a northwestern suburb of Gen ...
) who run the experiments, as well as the
theoretical physicists
The following is a partial list of notable theoretical physicists. Arranged by century of birth, then century of death, then year of birth, then year of death, then alphabetically by surname. For explanation of symbols, see Notes at end of this ar ...
who attempt to provide a conceptual framework for the LHC's results. The film begins in 2008 with the first firing of the LHC and concludes in 2012 with the successful identification of the
Higgs boson
The Higgs boson, sometimes called the Higgs particle, is an elementary particle in the Standard Model of particle physics produced by the quantum excitation of the Higgs field,
one of the fields in particle physics theory. In the Stan ...
.
The Communication Awards of the
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (also known as NASEM or the National Academies) are the collective scientific national academy of the United States. The name is used interchangeably in two senses: (1) as an umbrell ...
awarded a $20,000 prize for excellence in communicating science to the general public in Film/Radio/TV to David Kaplan and Mark Levinson for "Particle Fever" on October 14, 2015. The awards are given to individuals in four categories: books, film/radio/TV, magazine/newspaper and online, and are supported by the W. M. Keck Foundation.
Synopsis
The film is composed of two narrative threads. One follows the large team of experimental physicists at CERN as they try to get the LHC running properly. After a promising initial test run, the LHC suffers a liquid helium leak in 2007 that damages its
electromagnets
An electromagnet is a type of magnet in which the magnetic field is produced by an electric current. Electromagnets usually consist of wire wound into a coil. A current through the wire creates a magnetic field which is concentrated in ...
.
Fabiola Gianotti
Fabiola Gianotti (; born 29 October 1960) is an Italian experimental particle physicist who is the current and first woman Director-General at CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research) in Switzerland. Her first mandate began on 1 Janua ...
, Martin Aleksa, and Monica Dunford are all shown discussing how to handle the negative publicity surrounding the accident, and how to proceed. After repairs in 2009, the LHC begins to run experiments again at half power.
The other thread follows the competing theories of
Nima Arkani-Hamed
Nima Arkani-Hamed ( fa, نیما ارکانی حامد; born April 5, 1972) is an American-Canadian and his mentor
Savas Dimopoulos
Savas Dimopoulos (; el, Σάββας Δημόπουλος; born 1952) is a particle physicist at Stanford University. He worked at CERN from 1994 to 1997. Dimopoulos is well known for his work on constructing theories beyond the Standard Model.
...
. In the film, Arkani-Hamed advocates for the "
multiverse
The multiverse is a hypothetical group of multiple universes. Together, these universes comprise everything that exists: the entirety of space, time, matter, energy, information, and the physical laws and constants that describe them. The dif ...
" theory, which predicts the mass of the Higgs boson to be approximately 140
giga-electronvolts. Dimopoulos argues for the more-established
supersymmetry
In a supersymmetric theory the equations for force and the equations for matter are identical. In theoretical and mathematical physics, any theory with this property has the principle of supersymmetry (SUSY). Dozens of supersymmetric theories ...
theory, which predicts the mass of the Higgs boson to be approximately 115 GeV.
The narrative threads combine at the end of the film, when CERN announces the confirmed existence of a Higgs-like particle, with a mass of approximately 125 GeV. The discovery of the particle is met with a standing ovation, and
Peter Higgs
Peter Ware Higgs (born 29 May 1929) is a British theoretical physicist, Emeritus Professor in the University of Edinburgh,Griggs, Jessica (Summer 2008The Missing Piece ''Edit'' the University of Edinburgh Alumni Magazine, p. 17 and Nobel Prize ...
is shown wiping away tears. However, neither of the competing theories of the universe is definitively supported by the finding.
Later, Kaplan is shown admitting that ''none'' of his theoretical models are supported by this finding, and that the long-term implications of the discovery are unclear.
Production
The film was shot over a period of seven years. It was directed by
Mark Levinson, a former theoretical physicist with a doctorate from
UC-Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant univ ...
. Levinson produced the film along with
David Kaplan, a professor of physics at
Johns Hopkins University
Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hemisphere. It consi ...
and producers Andrea Miller, Carla Solomon and Wendy Sax.
The team gathered nearly 500 hours of footage from both professional camera crews and amateur video self-recordings shot by the physicists themselves.
This footage was then edited by
Walter Murch, who had previously won
Academy Awards
The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...
for his work on ''
Apocalypse Now
''Apocalypse Now'' is a 1979 American epic war film produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The screenplay, co-written by Coppola, John Milius and Michael Herr, is loosely based on the 1899 novella '' Heart of Darkness'' by Joseph ...
'' and ''
The English Patient
''The English Patient'' is a 1992 novel by Michael Ondaatje. The book follows four dissimilar people brought together at an Italian villa during the Italian Campaign of the Second World War. The four main characters are: an unrecognisably burn ...
''.
Kaplan worked closely with
MK12 to create the animated sequences which are used throughout the film.
The film premiered at
Sheffield Doc/Fest
Sheffield DocFest (formerly styled Sheffield Doc/Fest), short for Sheffield International Documentary Festival (SIDF), is an international documentary festival and Marketplace held annually in Sheffield, England.
The Festival includes film s ...
on July 14, 2013.
Release
''Particle Fever'' was shown at several
festivals
A festival is an event ordinarily celebrated by a community and centering on some characteristic aspect or aspects of that community and its religion or cultures. It is often marked as a local or national holiday, mela, or eid. A festival ...
before opening in
limited release
__FORCETOC__
Limited theatrical release is a film distribution strategy of releasing a new film in a few theaters across a country, typically art house theaters in major metropolitan markets. Since 1994, a limited theatrical release in the Unit ...
in the United States on March 5, 2014.
Critical response
The film received critical acclaim, with reviewers praising the film for making theoretical arguments seem comprehensible, for making scientific experiments seem thrilling, for making
particle physicists
Particle physics or high energy physics is the study of fundamental particles and forces that constitute matter and radiation. The fundamental particles in the universe are classified in the Standard Model as fermions (matter particles) a ...
seem human, and for promoting
physics outreach. Several reviewers singled out Murch's editing for praise.
On his blog, theoretical physicist and
string theory
In physics, string theory is a theoretical framework in which the point-like particles of particle physics are replaced by one-dimensional objects called strings. String theory describes how these strings propagate through space and intera ...
critic
Peter Woit
Peter Woit (; born September 11, 1957) is an American theoretical physicist. He is a senior lecturer in the Mathematics department at Columbia University. Woit, a critic of string theory, has published a book ''Not Even Wrong'' (2006) and writ ...
called the film "fantastically good", but cautioned that Arkani-Hamed's linking of the Higgs boson to multiverse theory was a tenuous proposition, as this theory did not currently make testable predictions.
On
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wan ...
the film has an approval rating of 96% based on 48 reviews, with an average rating of 7.92 out of 10. The site's consensus states: "The concepts behind its heady subject matter may fly over the heads of most viewers, but ''Particle Fever'' presents it in such a way that even the least science-inclined viewers will find themselves enraptured."
On
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...
, the film has an 87 out of 100 rating, based on 18 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".
Awards
In 2016, it was one of the inaugural winners of the
Stephen Hawking Medal for Science Communication
The Stephen Hawking Medal for Science Communication is an honor bestowed by the Starmus Festival to individuals in science and the arts to recognize the work of those helping to promote the public awareness of science.
History
The Stephen Hawki ...
.
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Particle Fever
2013 films
2013 documentary films
American documentary films
CERN
Documentary films about science
Films set in Switzerland
Films shot in Switzerland
2010s English-language films
2010s American films