Ken Burns' documentary about World War II is in progress on PBS. I have watched a good chunk of it, and haven't been impressed. Part of it is my expectations for Burns, and part of it, I think, is that WWII has already been 'done' in American cinema and culture over the past 10-15 years. Instead of writing a review, I'll link to the review in The New Yorker, which I am in complete agreement with. Key sentence: "At fifteen hours, “The War” is too much of a not good enough thing."
Friday, September 28, 2007
The War
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
6 comments:
I've only had time to watch the first segment. It was risky to randomly choose four scattered towns for the interviews. I thought it was pretty great though inevitably uneven and scattershot. I'm looking forward to the rest.
i've watched a couple segments as i've caught them (let it be duly noted that i no longer have a dvr), and was not impressed enough to work it into my routine. i think your assessment, lawyer, is a good one. i watched the segment on the guadalcanal, and while the interviews were interesting, there was nothing particularly new or noteworthy raised. still, i plan on wading through it at some point. my knowledge of wwII isn't as strong as i'd like.
1. I can't get over the narration by the bad guy/pimp in Requiem For a Dream (Keith David) - I keep expecting him to say "I know it's pretty baby, but I didn't take it out for air."
2. No DVR? Wow, sounds like step 1 to your journey to Alaska.
After 2 more segments, I'm beginning to think Burns's decision to choose ordinary people to supply the interviews was a mistake. In "The Civil War", Burns quoted Lincoln, Frederick Douglas, etc. Here, he avoids Churchill, Roosevelt, Patton, etc.
In addition, the stuff I didn't know (the disastrous landing at Anzio, the difficulties the Allies faced in Italy) are interesting. But WWII has, in fact, been done whereas the Civil War has not. Nearly every interesting WWII story has been covered by great movies already. Plus, it seems to be going uncomfortably out of its way to be all-inclusive and politically-correct.
He just shouldn't have done all ordinary people or all generals. He overthought it. The Civil War blended the soldier's experiences with the leader's experiences.
I like the D-Day presentation, as it clearly explained the phases and different beaches in a way that allowed me to 'learn' that information instead of just knowing it.
I finally finished watching it all and liked the vast majority of it. There were staggering images from the Pacific War and the German detention camps that I've never seen anywhere else. And most of the interviewees had at least one devastating emotional moment that will remain with me. If only they would have taken out some of the mundane stateside stuff.
Post a Comment