
Mechanical Marvels: Clockwork Dreams(2013)
Documentary presented by Professor Simon Schaffer which charts the amazing and untold story of automata - extraordinary clockwork machines designed hundreds of years ago to mimic and recreate life. The film brings the past to life in vivid detail as we see how and why these masterpieces were built. Travelling around Europe, Simon uncovers the history of these machines and shows us some of the most spectacular examples, from an entire working automaton city to a small boy who can be programmed to write and even a device that can play chess. All the machines Simon visits show a level of technical sophistication and ambition that still amazes today.

Movie: Mechanical Marvels: Clockwork Dreams
Top 4 Billed Cast
Himself - Presenter
Flute Player
Himself - Senior Curator of Horology, Royal Observatory Greenwich

Mechanical Marvels: Clockwork Dreams
HomePage
Overview
Documentary presented by Professor Simon Schaffer which charts the amazing and untold story of automata - extraordinary clockwork machines designed hundreds of years ago to mimic and recreate life. The film brings the past to life in vivid detail as we see how and why these masterpieces were built. Travelling around Europe, Simon uncovers the history of these machines and shows us some of the most spectacular examples, from an entire working automaton city to a small boy who can be programmed to write and even a device that can play chess. All the machines Simon visits show a level of technical sophistication and ambition that still amazes today.
Release Date
2013-06-03
Average
7.333
Rating:
3.7 startsTagline
Genres
Languages:
EnglishKeywords
Recommendations Movies

Mary Magdalene: Art's Scarlet Woman(en)
Waldemar Januszczak explores the impact of Mary Magdalene's myth on art and artists. In art all Christian saints are inventions but Mary Magdalene has been the subject of more invention and re-invention than any other.

The Way to the Heart(en)
Ava, an award-winning chef at a big-city restaurant, has lost her spark. Her boss sends her out to find herself to save her menu and her job. She returns home and finds little to inspire her, but when she reunites with her childhood friend Logan, Ava has to get her head out of the clouds and her foot out of her mouth to rediscover her passion for food.

Kill Shot(en)
Posing as hunters, a group of terrorists are in search of $100 million that was stolen and lost in a plane crash en route from Afghanistan.

Krampus: The Return(en)
After Lisa's brother mysteriously dies, she and her college friends go to her family home for answers. They are shocked to discover that his killer was non-other than the Christmas demon, Krampus.

I Want to Return Return Return(en)
A depiction of the Wrangelkiez neighbourhood in Berlin. The people portrayed tell their life stories. One woman came to the neighbourhood a decade ago to work in Berlin’s still unfinished Brandenburger Airport, one man reminisces his childhood on a Tobacco farm in Kentucky, another speaks of an exceptional day in an otherwise monotonous workplace. These portraits are interwoven with the story of Elpi, a Greek woman who is waiting for the long overdue visit of an old important friend. The outcome of this mixture is a film which captures the lives and perspectives of some of Wrangelkiez’s most commanding citizens, while at the same time evoking the loss that change and time passing means for places and for people.

Transformers: Titans Return(en)
After the Combiner Wars ended, Cybertron started to be rebuilt. However, an undead Starscream has been reincarnated as Trypticon, wreaking havoc around him. To combat this menace, Windblade gathers up a ragtag team of Transformers, including Optimus Prime and Megatron, to resurrect an ancient ally. And while some may be forever changed by the events, others may not emerge with their sparks intact.

Return to Zero(en)
Based on the true story of a successful couple, Maggie and Aaron who are preparing for the arrival of their first child.

Return to Mayberry(en)
After being away for awhile, Andy Taylor returns home to Mayberry to visit Opie, now an expectant father. While there he ends up helping Barney Fife mount a campaign for sheriff.

Little Dixie(en)
Erstwhile Special Forces operative Doc Alexander is asked to broker a truce with the Mexican drug cartel in secrecy. When Oklahoma Governor Richard Jeffs celebrates the execution of a high-ranking cartel member on TV, his Chief of Staff and Doc inform him about the peace he just ended. But it’s too late, as Cuco, the cartel’s hatchet man, has set his vengeful sights on Doc’s daughter Dixie.

The Return(en)
The Return is a 2016 documentary directed by Emmy Award winning director Erich Joiner chronicling Ford GT's return to 24 Hours of Le Mans after their 1966 1-2-3 victory.

Kamen Rider W Returns: Kamen Rider Eternal(ja)
Set primarily before the events of Kamen Rider W Forever, Kamen Rider Eternal tells the story of Daido Katsumi, the formation of NEVER, the mission that led them to target Fuuto, and reveals just how Daido obtained his Lost Driver and got his first taste of the power of Kamen Rider Eternal. As a mysterious woman retells this story to Phillip and Shotaro, they realize that Daido may not have been the simple monster he first appeared to be…

Gulliver Returns(en)
World traveler and adventurer Gulliver is invited to return to Lilliput, the town he previously saved from the enemy fleet of the neighboring Blefuscu.

Maroun Returns to Beirut(ar)
2023 marked the thirtieth anniversary of Maroun Baghdadi’s sudden and tragic death. Maroun was a Lebanese filmmaker who wrote and directed films during the Lebanese civil war and contributed to documentary and fiction filmmaking from 1973 up until his death in 1993. In this film, Feyrouz Serhal embarks on a day trip in Beirut and navigates the city that profoundly shaped Maroun’s journey in life and cinema. Here she encounters individuals who were close to him and who shared his experiences. And as she traverses Maroun’s life and career, the social and political backdrop moves to the foreground. The film reflects on the last fifty years of the history of the country from a present standpoint. Through Maroun’s story, we perceive how cinema can, beautifully and dramatically, portray our stories and discourse our life events..

Avatar Spirits(en)
Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino, co-creators of the hit television series, Avatar: The Last Airbender, reflect on the creation of the masterful series.

Return with Honor(en)
Rowe McDonald is a headstrong missionary who has life after his mission all figured out. When a fatal car crash interrupts his plans, he is given sixty days to return to life and finish his work. Now he must choose whether to lead the life he planned, or reach beyond himself to change the lives of others. What will he do? Who will he touch? How will he prepare to leave it all behind?

Return of the Goodies(en)
The Goodies finally return to television after nearly 25 years with a compilation of classic clips, interviews and new material.

The Return of Sister Street Fighter(ja)
When Koryu's childhood friend Shurei is abducted by gangsters, the desperate young woman recruits a female martial artist and a tough-as-nails stranger to join her for a dangerous rescue mission.

Her Return(pl)
An industrialist's wife announces that she is leaving him, but returns shortly after and tells him that she will only stay with him for appearances. This causes the industrialist to rethink his life choices.

Slayers Return(ja)
Lina Inverse and Naga the White Serpent are back! What begins as a routine bandit-stomping turns into the adventure of a lifetime involving magical golems, an ancient Elven weapon and even someone bent on destroying the world. It's a predicament only Lina and Naga could get themselves in to.
Similar Movies

Built for Mars: The Perseverance Rover(en)
BUILT FOR MARS: THE PERSEVERANCE ROVER goes behind the scenes at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory to follow the birth of the Perseverance rover.

Rosies of the North(en)
They raised children, baked cakes... and built world-class fighter planes. Sixty years ago, thousands of women from Thunder Bay and the Prairies donned trousers, packed lunch pails and took up rivet guns to participate in the greatest industrial war effort in Canadian history. Like many other factories across the country from 1939 to 1945, the shop floor at Fort William's Canadian Car and Foundry was transformed from an all-male workforce to one with forty percent female workers.

The Strait Guys(en)
THE STRAIT GUYS follows Czech-born mining engineer, George, and his fast-talking protégé, Scott, along the proposed route of the InterContinental Railway through Alaska, to the Bering Strait and onward to Russia. The “Strait Guys” endeavor to convince international governments, corporations, and indigenous tribes to green-light their $100 billion railway project, which would provide ground-based infrastructure across the continents, relieve overcrowded Pacific ports, improve global supply chains, and ease tensions between the superpowers. The US and Russia have been successfully collaborating in space for decades. Now the Strait Guys are out to prove it is also possible down here on earth.

Reimagining A Buffalo Landmark(en)
The Richardson Olmsted Campus, a former psychiatric center and National Historic Landmark, is seeing new life as it undergoes restoration and adaptation to a modern use.

The History of the Pit Stop: Gone in Two Seconds(en)
The mavericks who pioneered the modern pit stop made it a raceday staple that takes less than two seconds.

Artifishal(en)
Narratives of ecologists and conservationists are pitted against the human tendency to engineer and control in this probing documentary on the lucrative salmon-hatchery industry.

Unknown: Cosmic Time Machine(en)
A unique behind-the-scenes access to NASA’s ambitious mission to launch the James Webb Space Telescope, following a team of engineers and scientists as they take the next giant leap in our quest to understand the universe.

Drafting: Occupations & Opportunities(en)
Treats drafting as a means of visual communication and a key to organized training and planning. Discusses the importance of drafting in various fields such as architecture, engineering, and industry. Drafting allows individuals to communicate their ideas visually, leading to accurate planning and construction. It is emphasized that drafting skills open up numerous career opportunities in different industries.

Inquiry: The Great British Housing Disaster(en)
David Jones investigates how 1960s council housing came to be built so poorly that thousands later needed to be demolished.

The A350: Star of the Skies(en)
After 10 years of tests and 12 billion Euros invested, the state-of-the-art Airbus jet completed its first commercial flight in January 2015. We will discover how it was conceived and built, and explore its technological innovations every step of the way.

Flood in the Desert(en)
Explore the 1928 collapse of the St. Francis Dam, the second deadliest disaster in California history. A colossal engineering and human failure, the dam was built by William Mulholland, a self-taught engineer who ensured the growth of Los Angeles by bringing the city water via aqueduct. The catastrophe killed more than 400 people and destroyed millions of dollars of property.

Cutting Corners(en)
With building collapses happening around the country, activists band together to confront the real estate developers and hold them accountable for the construction destruction, lives they have destroyed, and deaths they have caused.

Sealab(en)
The Sealab project, launched in 1969 off the shore of northern California, was the brainchild of a country doctor turned naval pioneer who dreamed of pushing the limits of ocean exploration like NASA did space exploration. The massive, 300-ton tubular structure was a pressurized underwater habitat, complete with science labs and living quarters for divers who would live and work there on the ocean floor for days or even months at a time. During the height of the Space Race, this daring program also tested the limits of human endurance and revolutionized the way humans explore the ocean.

David Macaulay: Cathedral(en)
Author David Macaulay hosts CATHEDRAL, based on his award-winning book. Using a combination of spectacular location sequences and cinema-quality animation, the program surveys France's most famous churches. Travel back to 1214 to explore the design of Notre Dame de Beaulieu, a representative Gothic cathedral. The program tells period tales revealing fascinating stories of life and death, faith and despair, prosperity, and intrigue.

Spotlight on the Highlands(en)
It's 1948 and hydro-electric power is transforming Scotland's Grampians.

People and the Nile(ar)
The construction of the Aswan dam as seen by those who took part in it: engineers, workers, Egyptians, and Soviets.

Guy Martin: The World's Fastest Electric Car?(en)
Join self confessed petrol-head Guy Martin as he learns about the alternative to the internal combustion engine, Electric. In this TV special, Guy learns about the advantages of electric transport and the different varieties that exist from bicycles, cars and vans up to buses. Guy also learns some of the disadvantages from range anxiety and with the help of the Leicestershire Fire Brigade, how to deal with a fire. The ultimate aim is to produce a record breaking electrified retro road car that is suitable for the Drag strip, with Guy behind the steering wheel.

Water and the Dream of the Engineers(en)
Documentary where rich social history frames a spirited debate on the development of water infrastructure throughout the USA.