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Documentaries

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KharBevNor:
Ok, who else here loves documentaries? I have a thing for a seriously good documentary series, and my a seriously good documentary series I mean:

Blue Planet
Vikings!
Earth Story
The Ascent of Man
A Picture of Britain

All of which use the classic formula of taking a very broad over-arching topic, breaking it down into one manageable area per episode, getting a really good presenter with a strong personality, and then attacking the subject with a broad range of interesting techniques, incorporating some breath-taking cinematography and lots of highly interesting asides. Of them all, Vikings! with Magnus Magnusson and Earth Story with Aubrey Manning are the least known. I think Earth Story is actually running on discovery now though. Get Vikings! on video. It's worth it just for the title sequence, which is probably responsible for influencing my life a LOT more than it should. Also, it shits on that Blood of the Vikings bollocks. FROM A GREAT HEIGHT.

Anyone else a fan? I also, I must point out, like good travel documentaries (Pole to Pole (and most of Palins stuff), The Island Race, Notes From a Small Island etc.) and also what I shall call 'Discovery channel filler schlock', which covers those mass-produced engineering or war-themed documentary series that all seem to have the same, anonymous narrator (Like 'Raids of World War Two' and 'Speed Machines') and the related fly-on-the-wall type shows (American Chopper, Scrapheap Challenge, Salvage Squad, etc.) Oh, and that one about Aeroplanes with Bruce Dickinson. Just because it's got big Aeroplanes and Bruce Dickinson.

Oh my, and isn't Time Team just one of the best TV Series formulas EVER?

Seriously, if it wasn't for the insanely annoying adverts and the tediously repetitive shows about ancient Egypt, I could watch Discovery and UK History/Documentary...well, pretty much forever.

chupones:
Some of my favorite documentaries--

Hoop Dreams
The Thin Blue Line
The Endurance
Baraka
The Fog of War
Salesman
Grey Gardens
Hearts and Minds
Anne Frank Remembered
Shooting War
The Crusades
Blue Planet
The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg
Lost in La Mancha
A Decade Under The Influence
Gigantic: A Tale of Two Johns
Ingmar Bergman Makes A Movie

and a novelty documentary title... A Evening with Kevin Smith.

KharBevNor:
Dammit, how could I forget The Crusades?

Also, the series of 'Letter From America'. As a regular listener to the series, I particularly enjoyed it. Alistair Cooke's passing deserved far more mourning than it got.

Inlander:
Did anyone here see To Be and To Have?  It's an absolutely gorgeous documentary about a one-classroom school in rural France.  It was quite popular in Europe when I was there a couple of years ago, but when it was released in Australia last year it wasn't nearly so succesful, which is a real shame.  It's one of the best films I've seen in recent years.

chupones:
I'd be all over that, but there is nowhere I can rent it or purchase it in the US.

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