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Review: 'War' commands attention

BY VERNE GAY | verne.gay@newsday.com

September 23, 2007

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How presumptuous of Ken Burns to think he could render World War II in a mere blip of a documentary, weighing in at just 15 hours.

Four hundred and seven thousand U.S. military deaths. Ninety-four divisions engaged in battle. One million pairs of boots on the beaches of Normandy alone. And every man, woman and child in the United States - 137 million - profoundly affected by two vast theaters of war.

The emotional toll is as raw and gaping as it was more than 60 years ago. (Don't believe me? Then ask your elderly neighbor down the street, who may have lost a brother or father.) Fifteen hours is a tick of the clock.

What was Burns thinking? Perhaps this: That the war is still very much with us, and to forget what happened is to forget, in some elemental and terrible way, who we are. Yes, Burns was presumptuous, but the miracle is that he has succeeded. "The War" is magnificent and a triumph in every conceivable way.

It's also the finest documentary on the war since 1974's 26-part "The World at War," which pretty much remains the de facto standard. The difference here is that Burns and his co-producer, Lynn Novick, have a profoundly different purpose. Back in 1974, Jeremy Isaacs shifted his focus relentlessly so that the entire war in all its horror was captured. The Eastern front, for example, is barely mentioned here, and you'll have to strain to hear the word "Stalingrad."

This, then, is the American war. We see the home front portrayed in four towns across the country (Waterbury, Conn.; Mobile, Ala.; Luverne, Minn., and Sacramento, Calif.), with a few side trips to different places along the way because Burns and Novick placed a huge bet that representative stories emerged from these far-flung places. The bet paid off.

The Burns style - so familiar from 1990's "The Civil War" - remains firmly in place: Pick a town, interview a few people (tight head shots), read letters, interweave this tapestry with a rich lode of stock footage, and overlay with music, preferably contemporary. The effect can be woozy, even hallucinatory. A Wynton Marsalis riff can (and does) accompany horrific battle footage, while Count Basie or Aaron Copland or the Duke are the leitmotivs for the home front.

And the faces? You'll know them well after these hours. There's Mobile's Katharine Phillips, who pronounces "war" as "wah." There's Bethel, Conn., native Joseph Vaghi, who was at Omaha Beach. There's Quentin Aanenson of Luverne, who was a P-47 Thunderbolt pilot and recalls his flights with stunning clarity.

Burns and Novick try to get themselves off the hook at the outset of each installment with the on-screen proviso that thousands of battles were fought in the war, and that it's beyond the reach of anyone to document them all. But it sure seems like our guides take us to quite a few.

"The War" was bitterly denounced by some Hispanic veterans groups, which felt Hispanics weren't adequately represented. Burns apparently fixed the oversight (though not in time for the version I saw). But one of the finest things here is the exploration of the wartime experiences of African-American and Japanese-American veterans. Those are richly detailed and nuanced documentaries in their own right.

Enough. There's 15 hours ahead of you, and my suggestion is to get your kids to watch as well. The experience will change them, and enrich them. This, after all, is what TV does best.

THE WAR. In Ken Burns' film, the "Good War" is refought, and it is unforgettable. Premieres Sunday at 8 p.m. on WNET/13 and 10 p.m. WLIW/21. Subsequent episodes air Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, next Sunday, Oct.1 and Oct. 2 at 8 p.m. on WNET/13 and 10 p.m. on WLIW/21.