Director James Marsh' UK documentary "Project Nim", follows scientist Professor Herbert S. Terrace, who used baby chimpanzee 'Nim Chimpsky' to be the subject of an extended study of 'animal language' at Columbia University, during the 1970's.
Since 98% of the DNA in humans and chimps is identical (with the remaining 2% having an unknown 'alien' origin), some scientists believed that a chimp raised in a human family, using 'ASL' (American Sign Language), would shed light on the way language is acquired and used by humans. To find out if a chimpanzee could learn to communicate with humans through sign language, the doc shows how the baby monkey was taught first how to dress himself, use the toilet and even by nursed by his first surrogate (human) mother Stephanie LaFarge.
At age five, 'Chimpsky' (given his name as a pun on 'Noam Chomsky', the theorist of human language structure and generative grammar at the time, who held that humans were 'wired' to develop language), was thrust out of this nurturing environment and back into a primitive, caged existence at a university research facility, with issues surrounding 'animal cruelty' and 'lab testing', mentioned in passing, illustrated by hard-hitting footage.
After his owners were reportedly going to sell Nim to a research lab, public involvement funded Nim's retirement to the 'Black Beauty Ranch', operated by 'The Fund for Animals', the group led by Cleveland Amory, in Texas, with Nim dying at the age of 26 from a heart attack.
Click the images to enlarge and Sneak Peek "Project Nim"...
