I Tivo-ed the entire series but so far just haven’t had time to watch it yet. If it’s anywhere near as good as his previous Civil War effort, I’m sure it will be outstanding.
Well, that is exactly what I was thinking. So much of it was off the mark.
For me “World at War” is still THE definitive piece on WWII... in style, content...everything. And of course, Sir Oliver could not have been a better choice for narrator. I remember watching it with my father, a WWII veteran. He was quiet but impressed with it.
Actually, with ‘The War’ by Ken Burns, I kept waiting for the thing to work. I tried to see it the way a young person would, who possessed only an incomplete or distorted understanding of the facts. I wanted to see if Burns would say anything to convey what my personal knowledge and education has taught me about the period.
Burns seemed bound and determined to present the thing as if events took place in a political vacuum. He tried, and I think succeeded in presenting a ‘LOOK MAGAZINE’ picture of the war. I mean, there was not a lot of depth there but instead, plenty of graphics and firsthand dialogue about events. That’s good, and in keeping with his plan to record veterans and others’ recollections but how do you recount the social/military/economic monolith of the 20th century while avoiding mention of the contemporaneous politics? Most of the true dimension of the times was left unexpressed because of Burns’ determination to make the telling as apolitical as possible. The effort seemed a little maladroit coming from him and it was emotionally and historically flat. There was a slight wheel wobble to the whole thing.