JIM ALLISON: BREAKTHROUGH—DOCUMENT OF A DISCOVERY
Jim Allison is an appealing figure, a Texas native who loves honky-tonk bars and plays harmonica for fun. In his day job, he heads an illustrious laboratory doing research into the source of cancer. Last year he received the Nobel Prize in Medicine for a game-changing discovery that has eliminated cancer cells in hundreds of thousands of people. Bill Haney’s documentary Jim Allison: Breakthrough reveals the incredible persistence, fortitude, and sacrifice that led to that success. The film explains Allison’s quest, and the way it evolved, with such clarity that even I can understand it—and I flunked my science courses in high school. I also came to learn how scientific research works: slowly. It takes a certain kind of person to court failure over and over again…
