Bounce: How the Ball Taught the World to Play

Bounce: How the Ball Taught the World to Play

Bounce: Taking us far, wide and deep into our ancient past to ask 'Why do we play ball?' For downloads and more information visit: http://ift.tt/1QVkG7J Like us on Facebook: http://ift.tt/1NFaEXJ Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/JourneymanVOD https://twitter.com/JourneymanNews Follow us on Instagram: http://ift.tt/1W4EN48 What is it about the shape of a ball that fascinates humans and animals alike? Accessible and fascinating, the doc explores the origins of our captivation with the ball and ball games. Travelling across time and around the world we discover that universally the ball has stamped its mark on our lives and fuelled our passion to compete. A compelling doc searching for the reasons we play. A make-shift ball bounces along a dusty dirt track of a Congolese village, chased by a crowd of young children. It’s a game rooted in a deep global history, “the most extraordinary personal and public theatre of the emotions and the human soul”. In Kirkwall, Scotland, grown men fiercely wrestle a ball through the streets in a violent game that is rooted in the beginnings of what we know today as football. Primal and exalted, the ball game is “a microcosm of our lives… it’s the place where we can act out the drama of human existence”. “Spin, uncertainty, variation, bounce.” These are the qualities of the ball that have entertained not only humans, but other social creatures. A strange spherical stone collection from early hominids indicates we've been playing with balls forever. And man's closest living relatives, the Bonobo monkeys, love to play their own ball games. The sequence beautifully illustrates a further axis across species and the ages of ball fixation. It’s everywhere we look – fruit, seeds, stones, the sun, planets, “the things that we depended on for our existence” points out one anthropologist. therefore he indicates, it's no surprise that the ball has become a focal point for human play and culture, linking deeply to our psychological development. The ball is at the centre of the biggest human evolutionary breakthroughs: sociality, intelligence, empathy, and morality. The unpredictability of the bouncing ball forces humans to create rules and boundaries, to negotiate and understand both the laws of physics and their connection to other people. From games of marbles in the school playground, to the mesmerising tricks of a juggler and the raucous cheers of the World Cup, stunning cinematography and expert interviews, capture the collective human experience of the ball. A far-reaching and intelligent exploration of the significance of the sphere. This is a doc that truly knocks it out of the park. Bounce LLC – Ref. 6538 Every week Journeyman offers a brand new documentary, fresh out of the cutting room. They're award winning documentaries, some destined for the festival circuit and some for broadcast. The one thing you can know is that here you get to see them when they're fresh, often before they appear anywhere else. To watch them in full go to our VOD platform at http://jman.tv