I love magic, especially close up magic. To fool the eyes of someone right in front of you, who is paying close attention, requires serious dedication and enormous investments of time. I’ve watched a few shows and biographies relating to magicians on Netflix.
Good, mediocre and great.
Continue reading “Magic on Netflix”
I’m a big fan of documentaries, one of the things I like most about Netflix is the large number of them on available and Ken Burns is my favorite documentary filmmaker.
The Vietnam War is a ten part documentary series written by Geoffrey C. Ward, directed by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick. Like most documentaries with Ken Burns name attached, it is thorough. The series covers everything. Not just the sixties and early seventies, but goes back to the French Colonial period and the First Indochina War and continues all the way to the fall of Saigon, then follows up with Vets going back to see how things have change since the war and sometimes meeting their former enemies.
Being Canadian and born around the time the US was withdrawing from Vietnam, all I knew about the war was what I saw on TV shows and movies. I didn’t know the U.S involvement spanned twenty years and five presidents, or that it involved traditional armies on both sides. TV always made it look like it was a purely guerrilla war.
That’s what I like most Burns’ documentaries. The level of detail and comprehensive coverage he gives to the subject. You aren’t given simple dates and anecdotes, but first hand accounts from civilians and soldiers on both sides of the conflict. Volunteers and draftees. Draft dodgers and POWs. There is no agenda in this series, notspecific narrative being pushed, just a presentation of the history delivered with peoples personal experiences.
It was an incredibly informative series and I’m glad I watched it. I can’t imagine what it must have been like for the people who had to live through it.
Nothing to do with the Marvel Comics event of the same name, this is a documentary series about espionage and covert operations during the second world war. Stories of missions done by groups like the SOE, SIG and Double X.
The history is incredible. I’ve only watched six episodes so far, but each and every one could easily be turned into a feature film.
Tales like that of the SIG, a group of German speaking jewish volunteers who undertook missions of sabotage disguised as German soldiers. Their missions had everything you’d see in a Hollywood blockbuster. A small group of underdogs on an impossible mission, betrayal and sacrifice.
The story of Dusko Popov, a double agent who tried to warn the FBI about an attack on Pearl Harbour only to have Hoover himself threaten to have him arrested under Mann Act if he didn’t leave the US. A man Ian Flemming was once assigned to keep an eye on, and who may have been the inspiration for Casino Royale.
Then there are operations Grouse and Gunnerside, efforts by the SOE to delay the Nazis from developing the atomic bomb.
Monty Woodhouse, who helped provide weapons and resources to Greek guerillas, only to have those same people turn around, once the Germans were driven out, and try to pull off a Communist coup that led to three years of civil war.
The tales are gripping and fantastic, but utterly factual. I highly recommend this to any history buff or fan of spy stories, hell, even if you aren’t, these are stories worth hearing. I don’t know where or if it is airing on TV, I’m watching it on Netflix, so you may be able to get it on DVD.
Late to the party, as usual 