Cornell Cinema offers tasty, mind-stretching Science on Screen showings

There are two more opportunities this semester to delve deeply into science through the art of film at Cornell Cinema in the College of Arts & Sciences.

The last two showings of the cinema’s “Science on Screen” initiative will include:

• Worlds Collide – "Particle Fever," CLASSE, and the Future of Particle Physics, with post-doc Xuan Chen, Cornell Laboratory for Accelerator-based Sciences and Education (CLASSE), Thursday, April 11, 7 p.m.
• “Back to the Future” and the Future of Electric Vehicles, with Eilyan Bitar, associate Professor and David Croll Sesquicentennial Faculty Fellow in electrical and computer engineering in the College of Engineering, Wednesday, May 1, 7 p.m.

An initiative of the Coolidge Corner Theatre in partnership with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Science on Screen® supports creative pairings of current, classic, cult, and documentary films with introductions by figures from the world of science, technology and medicine. 

The Cinema has hosted three other films this semester with special guests, the most recent being “Babette’s Feast,” on March 26, which included a special food tasting inspired by the film.

Guests were Chris Loss, the Louis Pasteur Lecturer in Food Science in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and Terry Acree, food science professor (CALS) and PhD student Hetvi Doshi from the College of Human Ecology, who shared research perspectives on the complex factors that impact flavor perception and the enjoyment that surrounds our experience of food. Cornell students Maria Le ‘24 and Sarah Langelben ’24 (both CALS) worked together to prepare “baba au rhum,” a delectable dessert featured in film, for audience members to enjoy, then shared research on three dishes from the movie and the culinary techniques used to create them. The event was part of National Evening of Science on Screen, which included more than 28 participating organizations across the U.S.

Previous events in the “Science on Screen” series have included:

• A conversation about the lack of regulatory policy around deep fake technologies alongside the film “Another Body” with Gili Vidan, assistant professor in the Department of Information Science at the Cornell Bowers College of Computing and Information Science, and Austin Bunn, associate professor in the Department of Performing and Media Arts and director of the Milstein Program in Technology and Humanity (A&S), and;
• Reflections on the enduring relevance of Godfrey Reggio’s “Koyaanisqatsi” for questions of environmental development, regulation, and management with Steven Wolf, associate professor of natural resources and the environment in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

“I am so inspired by the ways our faculty collaborators have embraced the opportunity to think creatively about their research through the lens of a film,” said Molly Ryan, director of Cornell Cinema (A&S). “Movies have a unique power to emotionally connect with people, and these pairings have offered new ways of seeing not only the films themselves but also our wider world. It is energizing to see faculty and students engaging with the cinema in this rigorous, interdisciplinary way and I look forward to future collaborations.”