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Life Story: A Horizon Special

Film telling the story of the race to discover the structure of DNA. Watson and Crick have the bright ideas and the will to win. But there's one little problem: Rosalind Franklin has the crucial data.

It's 1951. There's a race on, and two of the brightest and brashest young men in Cambridge are determined to win it. The prize is glittering. Eternal fame, glory and almost certainly a Nobel prize await whoever is first past the post - for the goal is nothing less than the secret of life itself.

So begins the extraordinary story of the race to the double helix of DNA, one of the greatest true detective stories of the 20th century.
Watson and Crick have the bright ideas and the will to win. But there's one little problem: Rosalind Franklin has the crucial data... and she plays the game by very different rules.

1 hour, 46 minutes

Credits

RoleContributor
Jim WatsonJeff Goldblum
Francis CrickTim Pigott-Smith
Maurice WilkinsAlan Howard
Rosalind FranklinJuliet Stevenson
Nicholas FryNicholas Fry
DirectorMick Jackson
ProducerMick Jackson
WriterWilliam Nicholson

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