Kern wrote:
Kern wrote:
BBC4 have picked up
Ken Burns' Vietnam, starting Monday at 21:00. Other than his famous Civil War doc (that I find hasn't aged well), I really enjoyed his one on prohibition and probably ought to get round to seeing his one on the West.
Watched the first two episodes this evening. It's very well done and I've learnt loads about the conflict already. It's also very uncompromising in its use of footage and photographs. Highly recommended.
The TL;DW is:
ZOMG Spoiler! Click here to view!
blame the French.
I have now watched all of 'THE VIETNAM WAR', quite a significant undertaking at over 17 hours, but very much worth the investment of time.
I decided to watch it because I realised I didn't actually know much about the war. I mean, we've all seen Platoon and Born On The Fourth of July and suchlike, we all know it was a 'bad' war and the Americans eventually called it quits - but if you'd have asked me two weeks ago for even basic information such as:
1) The history of the country
2) How many US troops were sent
3) Why did the USA get involved in the war beyond 'communism'
4) What was the political backdrop to the war
5) What happened after the US left
I'd have had no idea.
So going into this I was very keen to learn, and learn I did.
It is at times at a difficult watch, there wasn't a single episode that I didn't have to pause at least once (and often multiple times), to just have a little walk downstairs and find some trivial task to perform, to process what I was watching. I cried many times, and Mrs Hearthly and Jnr would often get extra big hugs when they went to bed.
The war footage and images are shocking enough, however the thing that affected me the most was the interviewees they had, from all sides of the conflict. And every single one of them would reach a point (or points) in their tale where their voice would crack, and in many cases weep, the pain and the horror of the war still capable of reducing them to tears over 40 years later.
I would recommend this documentary to everyone, its run length allows it to cover the origins of the conflict, the war itself and its aftermath in forensic and unsparing detail, I now feel that I have a solid understanding of a subject that, in honesty, I was essentially ignorant about before.
Documentary making at its finest.