Posted on 09/20/2007 12:39:48 PM PDT by dead
THIS is the big one.
I have spent the better part of my adult life watching TV for a living, and I have never experienced anything more powerful than this. "The War," the 14-hour documentary miniseries about World War II from epic-filmmakers Ken Burns and Lynn Novick, is this fall's main event.
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I can assure you that you have never seen anything like this before, even though it might seem as if World War II has been covered from every possible angle in the hundreds of other documentaries seen on TV over the years.
This one succeeds at encompassing the entire scope of the Second World War by telling its story from the point of view of the Americans from all walks of life who went abroad to fight it, and the ones who participated in the war effort at home.
Even if you have watched a thousand World War II documentaries, you have never heard stories about the war like the ones told here.
More than any other treatment of the war, this one really gets to the central issue - the killing, and how ordinary people did it. When you hear the stories told by some who were there and did some of the killing, you will not believe your ears.
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It's like you've been through something unique and awful that has changed you forever.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
I have always been a big fan of Ken Burns and I am really looking forward to this!
Hillary’s people are not going to like this, especially on PBS, what are they thinking we are coming into an election year.
Thanks dead.
It is a safe thing to do, pander to the “Greatest Generation” Sure helps out come the pledge drive. I wonder if Ken Burns will ever so honor the Afgan-Iraqi war vets. They volunteer, and re-enlist, in spite of negative press.
It is a safe thing to do, pander to the “Greatest Generation” Sure helps out come the pledge drive. I wonder if Ken Burns will ever so honor the Afgan-Iraqi war vets. They volunteer, and re-enlist, in spite of negative press.
I fear that one of the messages of this series will be that war is a barbaric thing, that men and women suffer and die and are irrevocably changed, and that the world needs to learn not to fight anymore.
The Left says "War never solved anything". I hope that Burns fully understands that war has solved a great many things.
So am I! Did you see his Civil War series? He did a great job.
Wow! Cool. Programming this to record (via the web) on my Tivo now. Thanks!
You just posted a link to my favorite parody of all time. It is a shame that Ken Burns has set him self up for this, but I like to think of it as more of an homage than an outright parody. But I’m optimistic that way.
That's all true yes, but war will be with us forever. It's in our nature.
If it’s anything like his “Civil War” series, it’ll be well worth watching.
LOL at “NASSA.”
ROTFLMAO!
There is a part on the Americans of Japanese decent participating the Europe theater.
Of the 1,800 New Mexico men sent to the Philippines, 900 survived the Battle for Bataan and the horrors and atrocities of the "death march" and the privation and deep humiliation of the 40 months spent in prisoner of war camps. My older cousin, Andy, was one of these. God rest his soul.
New Mexicans also parachuted into Europe on June 5th to be the first to invade the european mainland. My uncles on both sides of my family , my grandfather and lot of others all jumped into Europe on D-Day.
These omissions have been corrected for the release, and I for one, anticipate the story of the nations 'greatest generation' to be epic.
I think you may have some points, but I think you've put it in a very, very unfortunate way.
All service is honorable and potentially dangerous, but it is not all equal....it simply is not.
The generation of the Iraq wars has simply not been called upon -- has not had the opportunity to make the sacrifices and take the risks of WWII.
As miserable, dangerous, and thankless as Iraq service may be, it simply can not be compared to Okinawa or Midway or Battan or Normandy the Bulge or many other locations where there was no secure zone to fall back to and where death was not only a possibility for an unlucky few but a likely prospect for many.
Today's generation might be just as brave if called to that kind of service. But, thankfully, they have not been called.
If anything in America is sacred, it is the service of our soldiers in WWII. They didn't come up with that Greatest Generation thing for no reason at all.
Ping for later.
That’s funny, in my industry we call it “The Ken Burns Effect” . If we need to zoom and pan in an animation we just say “let’s Ken Burns it”
I thought The Civil War was a bit biased. I imagine that ol’ Ken will go for the crying towel drama buttons again.
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