The World At War (BBC 1973/74)

[Iconoclast]

i finished watching the exceptional series 'The World At War' this week.

_http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_world_at_war

The World at War is a 26-episode television documentary series on World War II, including the events leading up to it and following in its wake. [...] Commissioned in 1969, it took four years to produce, such was the depth of its research. It premiered on ITV in 1973 at a cost of £900,000, a record (at the time) for a British television programme. The series was narrated by Laurence Olivier and its score was composed by Carl Davis. [...] It is often considered to be the definitive television history of the Second World War. Some consider it the finest example of the documentary form. It also presented rare colour film footage of some of the war's events.

if anyone has the time to watch this extensive document i can only give it my highest recommendation.
watching it is an emotional tour de force - while i wouldn't say i'm easily affected by what i see on the sceen, i often had streams of tears rolling down my face when being confronted with the utter insanity that was world war two...

the stupidity of it! the futility! the horrors! the complete psychopathic lack of any common sense! the unimaginable waste of men and resources!

words fail me in describing the many unbelievable things that are seen and spoken about in this documentary.

a MUST SEE for anyone who wasn't alive during it!

 

[spyraal]

Hello everyone, Iconoplast

I also got this series from a magazine here. It is indeed full of darkness, madness and futility. Sometimes it makes you wonder if real life back then had any color or it was all black-and-white like the videos...
And the music score is also so fitting with the mood of the war... :(

But while watching this series, i kept reminding myself that all the horrors portrayed there are only what can be captured from the "winner's" perspective and only what can be told to the masses of people, and for that reason i guess it is more or less "mainstream" version of the real events...

The true horror would be, together with all these pictures of death, misery and suffering, to also expose all the "leaders" of the involved nations at that time (not only the Axis leaders) for their psychopathic characters, whose orders they were following, their masters hidden agendas and their behind the scenes manipulations that created and sustained the war for almost 5 years, and the hyper-dimensional or multi-density aspects of this world war... That would make the big picture even more sad and scary...!

If we put that little note aside, i think too that watching this series can show the horror and insanity of war and WW II in particular. The "winner" nation is but the one who manages to out-sacrifice the opponent to his exhaustion...

And right now i try to imagine Laura's "Secret History of the World" as a mini series... Now, that would be a jaw dropper!!!

:)