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If you like this sort of thing, check out The Death of Yugoslavia [1]. It's an absolutely riveting BBC documentary series, in six parts, about the break-up of Y

If you like this sort of thing, check out The Death of Yugoslavia [1]. It's an absolutely riveting BBC documentary series, in six parts, about the break-up of Yugoslavia, and about the subsequent wars and conflicts. I love how how methodical, matter-of-fact and neutral this documentary is (or at least it seems to me); the filmmakers don't take sides, and they work only to explain a series of historical events, portraying all sides equally in the process. The British English narration doesn't hurt, either. I rather prefer this format over Ken Burns', who turns up the emotional levels with personal "stories", folk music and photographs that look epic and timeless. Unfortunately, among documentarians, Burns' format is much more popular, probably because it's easier to do. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Death_of_Yugoslavia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Death_of_Yugoslavia

jacobush 9y ago
Easier in the sense, easier to get funding for, thus do, maybe. Not easy to implement. It took 10 years of dedicated work.
- lobster_johnson 9y ago
  Easier as in lower-hanging fruit, from a stylistic point of view. It's harder to make things interesting if you can't resort to the tricks of the Hollywood trade such as emotionally manipulative music, sound effects, dramatic zooms and rapid editing. I recognize and appreciate Ken Burns' craft and find his documentaries interesting and intelligent and clearly well-researched, but I also find his work to be extremely bland. Maybe it's because his style has been endlessly copied (I don't know if this is actually the case), but a Ken Burns documentary comes across, to me, like every American History Channel or Smithsonian Channel documentary blended together; it moves at a predictable, slow pace, always with a magisterial-sounding faceless narrator (usually Peter Coyote), featuring music tailored to each scene (from folksy to solemn or patriotic; if there's a saloon on screen there'll definitely be ragtime or bluegrass playing), and always with the air of solemn respectability. I'm a much bigger fan of directors like Errol Morris, Werner Herzog and Michael Madsen (Into Eternity), who enliven the format with fewer clichés.

jacobush 9y ago

Easier in the sense, easier to get funding for, thus do, maybe. Not easy to implement. It took 10 years of dedicated work.

lobster_johnson 9y ago
Easier as in lower-hanging fruit, from a stylistic point of view. It's harder to make things interesting if you can't resort to the tricks of the Hollywood trade such as emotionally manipulative music, sound effects, dramatic zooms and rapid editing. I recognize and appreciate Ken Burns' craft and find his documentaries interesting and intelligent and clearly well-researched, but I also find his work to be extremely bland. Maybe it's because his style has been endlessly copied (I don't know if this is actually the case), but a Ken Burns documentary comes across, to me, like every American History Channel or Smithsonian Channel documentary blended together; it moves at a predictable, slow pace, always with a magisterial-sounding faceless narrator (usually Peter Coyote), featuring music tailored to each scene (from folksy to solemn or patriotic; if there's a saloon on screen there'll definitely be ragtime or bluegrass playing), and always with the air of solemn respectability. I'm a much bigger fan of directors like Errol Morris, Werner Herzog and Michael Madsen (Into Eternity), who enliven the format with fewer clichés.