The War

[Radiobarry]

I watched the opening episode of Ken Burn's latest "epic" film, "The War" on PBS/KCET (which continues tonight with several more episodes to follow...repeating next week on Channel 24 in the I.E., and 50 in Orange County next week).

Even though each episode lasts almost 2 1/2 hours, I found the first one, at least, pretty riveting. He's using the lives of a few people in four towns across the country to tell the story.

I have watched all the Ken Burns stuff on PBS, and while I've liked some series better than others, it's usually well worth the time to check it out.

I have an interest in WWII history, and enjoy much of the imagery and song from that era. This film helps remind one of the bloody, harsh reality lining those, in somewhat the same was as films like "Saving Private Ryan" or "Flags Of Our Fathers/Letters From Iwo Jima".

I think I've picked the right forum for this. If it winds up more of a debate, so be it.

[nursemelis374]

I am tivo-ing this, it looks really good. The previews were all over tv and got me interested!

[Wren]

I wish I had TV just to watch this. I love his Civil War documentary.

[Wendygirl]

We forgot it was starting last night and tuned in right as it was going off at 10:30. But then it repeated again right away and so stayed up until 11:15 to watch but had to go to bed. I will be watching this in repeats I think. I thought Ken Burns Civil War docu was excellent (my daughter is a Civil War re-enactor).

What I saw of this new one was very good and it sure doesn't pull any punches showing the atrocities of war and what horrible people Hitler, Mussolini, and Tojo were. The honors that we are bestowing on this "greatest generation" are well deserved and I salute them.

[Radiobarry]

I wish I had TV just to watch this. I love his Civil War documentary.

I loved that also, and as you might suspect I also enjoyed his film on baseball. That aired during one of the darkest periods of my (sports fan) life - the players strike hat wiped out the end of the season, and post-season in 1994.

[sediment]

Read a part of USA Today that struck me as so poignant. In it, a pilot says that eventually he got to thinking he wasn't going to make it home, and that he probably should make his life count for something while he was still alive and fighting. He lived to tell this.

[Princess Buttercup]

I watched it last night with Ken and learned so many things I never knew about World War 2. It was really good. The only thing that was hard to take was some of the really gruesome footage.

[Opus1guy]

I loved that also, and as you might suspect I also enjoyed his film on baseball.

Let's not leave out Ken's very talented brother, Ric Burns. Ric has done dozens of other documentaries about various subjects in the same style...an almost trademarked style that he developed with his brother Ken. As an example and sort of related to this bulletin board, Ric Burn's "Coney Island" for "The American Experience" series on PBS...was IMHO, one of the best documentaries ever produced, directed, and edited...and totally conveyed and evoked the "feel" of time and place of America's first amusement park(containing themed parks), in its glory days. A wonderful, wonderful film that any theme park fan would enjoy. Worth hunting down.

[Radiobarry]

I watched it last night with Ken and learned so many things I never knew about World War 2. It was really good. The only thing that was hard to take was some of the really gruesome footage.

For reasons I cannot fathom, some people tend to kind of "romanticize" war. Movies and books over the years have tended to do this, especially WWII movies made in the 50's and 60's. It's good, I think, when people see war for what it's really like, no matter how necessary or noble the cause.

Did anybody see last night (Monday's) installment? I have it recorded, but haven't been able to watch it yet.

[Radiobarry]

Each episode I've seen so far has been very compelling. KCET also ran a local show on "California At War", recounting many stories, including those of the shelling of the Goleta oil fields, about a half hour north of where I now live.

[Trac]

I watched the first eps with my Dad - who was 10 when they bombed Pearl Harbor - so I got a lot of insight as to what happened in CA during the war - very interesting stuff - We have so much to learn from the 'older generation'

[Retrocool]

I've been watching this all week.

I've been a longtime World War II buff, and from the episodes that have aired so far, I believe this is one of the finest World War II documentaries ever made. The focus on personal human experiences of the war and how it impacted individuals and families, rather than broader military tactics and strategies and national and international politics, makes it much more compelling and watchable than so many other documentary films.

My only quibble with the series, and it's a relatively minor one relating to editing and structure, has to do with those of the Latino American veterans, as seen in the latter part of the first episode. As the film was being completed, Burns and company were very rightly criticized for overlooking the experiences of Latino Americans in the war, so they found a few Latino American vets, interviewed them, and compiled photos and footage relating to them toward the end of editing. Unfortunately, their stories are not interweaved seamlessly into the main body of the film, and so that portion of the film feels tacked on as an afterthought (which, frankly, it is, and better that it's there than not, but it would have made the film stronger if it were not so isolated from the rest of the narrative). This is a noticeable drawback, but the portions of the film that tell the Latino American tales are just as compelling in their own right as the rest of the stories in the film.

Overall, this is a landmark documentary series, an excellent primer for World War II study, and will very likely be seen in classrooms for years and years to come.

http://www.pbs.org/thewar/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=<obje...mbed></object>

[Retrocool]

The final episode for this was last night, and now (at least on my local PBS station) they're rerunning each episode every Wednesday night.

So, who watched it? I still believe that this is one of the very best World War II documentaries made. Sadly, some of the people interviewed have passed on since they were filmed, including Ray Leopold, who died of a heart attack at age 92 this past July.

[PanTheMan]

It was simply brilliant.

[tiggerfan]

I am still working through it, will catch the last 3 eps this weekend.

But it was well made. Not wanting to spoil it for those who havent gotten that far but I thought it a very effective technique to have built up one of the characters as someone we were following, and then have him killed. It broke my heart when it happened.