Frontline: The Quake

Graphic
A timely, graphic but limited account of the January 2010 earthquake in Port au Prince. Not deeply informative but the images and footage were moving, if not disturbing. The best documentary of the earthquake I have come across. Worth the purchase, in my opinion.





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Secrets of the Dead: Deadliest Battle

Deadliest Battle - Strange Premise
I mostly enjoyed this review of World War II's Battle of Stalingrad, with one major exception: The premise behind the episode is that 'new evidence' has emerged that shows Josef Stalin was not the military genius everyone previously believed, that he did not orchestrate the victory at Stalingrad. And to that I thought..."Huh? Who ever thought that, outside of perhaps some former Soviets and/or Russians?"

It has long been known that Stalin's purge of many military officers and his own bungling interference led to numerous disastrous defeats in the early years of the war. The Soviets lost literally millions of soldiers during Germany's push deep into the USSR in 1941 and 1942. Yes, the Germans eventually lost at Stalingrad, and yes, it can be argued that loss turned the tide of the war, but in any/all of the reading I've done on World War II, I've never encountered the opinion that Stalin was a military genius who was the brains behind this victory. Rather, the Germans...

Nothing "NEW"
Watched the whole thing hoping to learn something new. NEVER HAPPENED!I don't know where this so-called "new information" came from, because non of it was new to me, or any Stalingrad Vet I've spoken to.Both my grandfathers, who fought there, (and my great-uncles who served there as snipers, company commanders, regular army, communication corps, etc,) told me, back when I was a kid, about the mass retreat and NKVD oper-units. Just because the so-called Western Scholars didn't research deep enough to know, doesn't mean it was a secret. As such, the whole premise of this program, that is of having new data, is negated.Footage used is common war-time footage. Nothing special there either. 2 stars is about all I can give this one.For a real GREAT WWII documentary, watch Battlefield, also shown on PBS.



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Through A Dog's Eyes

Amazing organization, great video!!! A must see...
Canine Assistants is an organization based in Georgia. They match disabled individuals with a Service Dog to help mitigate the disability. This video follows a group of recipients during and after a "training camp." The recipients range from small children to adults.
What is so right about this video is that it shows the ups and downs of owning a SD. Many people think that it must be easy and fun to have a SD, and this video shows that that is not always the case. Some of the match-ups are wonderful, and others don't work out. In each case Canine Assistants is there to help their recipients and dogs find the best possible resolution.
This is a great video, and it is appealing to all audiences, whether you are disabled or not.

Great look at amazing dogs and people
This is an incredible look at service dogs, the people who train them, and the people they help. The bond between humans and dogs is incredible and this shows that taken to it's furthest levels.
If you love dogs you'll love this movie, and if you train dogs this is a must-see.

Through a Dog's Eyes
First saw this show on public television. So many people do not understand the many roles service animals provide for persons with disabilities. A great learning tool.

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Naturally Obsessed: The Making of a Scientist

a must for every Science Phd student and the ppl that love us!!!
I am a 5th yr Ph.D. student in Inorganic Chemistry and Materials Engineering...and this movie did a really good job of not only humanizing Grad students like me, but really gave a feel for how hard it is to be in these sorts of programs. Not to mention, how much we depend on good luck , and the support of others to get thru...I highly recommend this movie for the families of Phd students who love us but don't understand why we work 16-18 hr days for yrs but cant tell you why or when we will graduate. I'm glad someone took the time to tell our frustrating story.

Inspirational as well as educational
Naturally Obsessed: The Making of a Scientist is an award-winning documentary following the lives three biology graduate students pursuing a PhD and success in their chosen field. All three are competing in a worldwide race to be the first to publish their discoveries; their challenge is to figure out the structure and mechanism of AMPK, a protein involved in the burning and storage of fat. An extraordinary chronicle of years of hard work, packed with special features and even a discussion guide in .pdf format, Naturally Obsessed is inspirational as well as educational, and highly recommended. 60 minutes, widescreen.

teacher liked it students did not
I had hoped this video would inspire my high school science students. It was boring to most of them. I liked it myself.

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Worse Than War

A very important documentary
This is probably one of the most important documentaries of the last 20 years. It has just been shown on public TV in America. After World War II some people had the illusion that the German mass murder of the Jews was some sort of isolated event. Some people even said "never again". In reality the majority of the world's victims of political mass murder were slaughtered after, not before, the defeat of Nazi Germany. The biggest center of mass murder after World War II was Mao's China. Mao even publicly endorsed political mass murder (unlike Hitler or Stalin). Mao even praised the idea of a nuclear war that would kill most people on the planet as a good idea since it would lead (in his warped mind) to a victory for China. The grim record of the post World War II world spread death from Rwanda to Cambodia to Serbia in the heart of modern Europe.

Official attitudes to political mass murder today are hardly encouraging. The government of China has never been...

A chilling DVD documentary about the horrors of genocide, ethnic cleansing, and mass-murder
Based on Daniel Goldhagen's book with the same name, Worse than War is a chilling DVD documentary about the horrors of genocide, ethnic cleansing, and mass-murder. Meticulously studying the causes, patterns, and motives of genocide, as well as the role it plays in the interaction between nations, Worse than War gathers testimony on the phenomenon from victims, perpetrators, witnesses, humanitarians, historians, journalists, and more. Worse than War ultimately seeks to understand genocide so that it can more effectively be prevented and stopped - a goal that makes it worthy of the highest possible recommendation. 2 hours, widescreen.

great stuff
Goldhagen's work is elegantly logical, dispassionate, analytical and fact-based . . . resulting in some inarguable conclusions on man's inhumanity to man and how to manage and control and, indeed, stop it.

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Frontline: Behind Taliban Lines

Good source of short study of the OPFOR
Watched the video origianlly on PBS and had to order the video. As a military instructor, there are several occasions for showing this film...primarily to indicate that there is no shortage of opposing forces in the fight against terrorism, but also important to show that the opposing forces lack a critical component to US victory...team work! The video shows classic dysfunctional guerilla warfare. This video in addition to first hand experience/accounts will give an excellent presentation.

Interesting and Authentic -
The photographer for this video lived among the Taliban for almost two weeks, recording his conversations with them as well as their actions. They repeatedly spoke of driving out the 'non-believers,' their preserving their values. The Taliban group involved lived in a remarkably open section of Afghanistan and received taxes from the villagers that should have gone to the government. Their leader was a millionaire former car dealer. There weapons were drawn from former anti-Russia caches. The video also showed them preparing two roadside bombs prior to a raid - fortunately the bombs looked rather small in ineffectual, and later failed to detonated by their intended remote controls.

A cell phone video was shown that they had made of a former attack; cell phone communications were used to connect with their spotters and leaders. The attack location was under fog and offered cover within a cotton field. Upon return to their 'base,' they gave an optimistic false report to the...

The Taliban - Up Close
This is an interesting documentary conducted by Afghan journalist Najibullah Quaraishi in northern Afghanistan. He was invited to film a group of Taliban and another warrior group that wanted to disrupt a main highway, which was frequently used by Americans to transport war supplies and personnel. The overriding desire of the group was to rid Afghanistan of western influences.

The group did not have much to work with. They were cobbling together left-over rockets and munitions from the Russian invasion, which was over 30 years ago. There was also a lot of miscommunication and disputes within the group. The planned attack proved unsuccessful.

Although Quaraishi was supposed to stay-on for 2 full weeks some new insurgents from Pakistan branded him a spy and recommended he be beheaded. Quaraishi was able to safely exit the area though. On the way out of the country some local police officials met up with him and declared the area 'safe' (for the most part)...

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The Suicide Tourist

Very Happy
I plan to keep this DVD in mind as I age. I don't think that people have to die the HARD WAY!

A man on a mission to end his suffering
Craig Ewert, a man stricken with a condition that will eventually provide him with a long, slow, pain full death has decided to take the matter into his own hands. He chooses to travel with his wife Mary to Switzerland where under the most extreme circumstances, assisted suicide is legal. While there, he is interviewed and approved.

The film shows life in his last days, visiting with his children and conversations with his wife. He breaths from a ventilator, so each breath he takes is a struggle. The law states that he must take the medication under his own will to kill himself, so he has planned to drink an overdose of sleeping medication. As the days count down to his end, he worries that he will lose his ability to drink under his own power, and not be able to go through with it.

The end of the film is the hardest part. Not because of sadness for someone dying, but because with the cameras there, it almost feels intrusive at this point. Zooming in on the face...

Frontline takes on the tough topics
This one isn't easy to watch, but it provides empathetic view on a difficult topic - showing what it's like for both the people afflicted with debilitating terminal illnesses, as well as those who love and care for them.

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American Experience: My Lai

Fair Telling of a Dark period in American History
This 90 minute documentary is well done and does a nice job of giving a full picture of what happened before, during, and after the My Lai fiasco. For those who want to have a clearer understanding of the massacre this is well worth watching. It does a nice job of putting into perspective of what the soldiers were going through and their state of mind before they went into the village of My Lia that fateful day. Often times historic events are told without putting the people and situation into context of the times and events but this documentary does it's best to do so.

The documentary also covers all the players in the event, those who exposed what happen and those who tried to covered it up, and the Public. The public was as much of a player in this event and why many of the decisions that were made by the military and civilian leaders were done so. Clearly this is not a shinning moment in American history but we all should take note of it and learn from it so we don't...

Commander's Analysis: This operation was well planned, well executed. Friendly casualties were light...
Two news events in the first half of 1970 irrevocably altered the course of the Vietnam War. One was the National Guard killing of four Kent State University students (and the wounding of nine others) in May of that year. The other was the Cleveland Plain Dealer's publication two months earlier of an Army photographer's color snapshots of piles of civilian dead in a Qu'ng Ng

NOVA: The Pluto Files

Great documentary
This is a great short documentary explaining the controversy over the Pluto demotion. Neil deGrasse Tyson was part of the conflict and does a great job keeping the documentary entertaining enough for children while being very informative at the same time for the adults.

A superb addition to any school or public library collection
A new episode of the award-winning science documentary "NOVA", originally broadcast on public television, is now available on DVD. "The Pluto Files" (56 min.) is based on Neil deGrasse Tyson's book of the same name, and features a commentary from Tyson himself. "The Pluto Files" explains the controversy about Pluto, and why the American Museum of Natural History's Hayden Planetarium ceased to call Pluto a planet. Yet the concept of Pluto as a planet has captured so many hearts and minds - why is Pluto so cherished in the public's imagination? Could more Pluto-like celestial bodies exist within the Kuiper belt? A superb addition to any school or public library collection, enthusiastically recommended for its fascinating presentation as well as for its educational value.

Lighthearted and User-friendly
A scientific curator fails to place Pluto in a model of the solar system and it challenges laypeople's ideas about the last planet. This work explores why he made the decision and why it upset so many. This would be a very good documentary to show in junior high school science classes.

Mankind only knew of Pluto's existence since the 1930s. This work does bring up Disney's Pluto, if you were wondering. Issues of nationalism arise as well. Since an American found Pluto, that may play a role in living Americans' demanding that the mass be deemed a planet.

I loathe science, and especially the ogres and gnomes who taught it to me. This documentary can be embraced by people like me who usually want nothing to do with the subject. This shows famous news reporters and a Disney descendant. It includes Harvard scholars, but it shows them on Harvard's football field, rather than in a lecture hall.

What I love about this work is how it discusses category...

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Agatha Christie Hour: Set One

Another rip-off for Americans
I have been waiting for years for these programs to come to dvd! My family and I watched them on A&E many years ago when it was still a good network. The scripts are excellent, the acting superb. Rather atypical fare for Christie dramatizations, but still quite worthy. I am giving the programs 5 stars for content.

The complaint that I have is with the marketing here in America. There were actually 10 dramatizations done for The Agatha Christie Hour. This set contains only five for, at this writing, $28.99. The British set contains all 10 stories and is labeled as "the complete set". It was released only about a month ago with the same cover art (a five disc set, two stories per disc), so it's not as if our American set is a re-release or a re-think. So, again as of this writing, the British set containing all 10 stories is available from Amazon.co.uk (in case the site name is deleted, it's this site's sister site in England) ~ at a price of $31.35 after conversion to...

Period British drama from the writer of Poirot
Agatha Christie has done more for British Mystery than any other writer, and this set provides some of her lesser known tales. It's not Poirot, but some of the Poirot characters first appeared in these stories. Five different mysteries, but all taking place in the 1920-30s period, and provide a look at a bit more of Christie than perhaps Poirot displays. There is more to Agatha Christie than just mystery.

The true question for this series is not Will Christie's stories be good?; but Will the acting be up to script level? Are the actor's worthy? They are. The series is cast with several British members of high achievement and fame. The 5 episodes give us interesting mixes from romance to crime. They come alive, enchanting at times, suspenseful at other times.

Episode details:
"Case of the Middle-Aged Wife": London's Parker Pyne (Maurice Denham), 'Dr. of Happiness' is engaged by a cheated-upon wife. Does it help, Mr. Pyne, to reverse the cheating participants...

A Look at Agatha Christie's Early Non- Poirot Work
"The Agatha Christie Hour, Set 1" another classic British mystery television series, and a long-awaited one, finally arrives here. Ten episodes of it were made by Thames Television for Britain's ITV (independent television stations), in 1982; it was broadcast on Public Broadcasting's "Mystery!" in the early 1980s. We now get the first five stories, showing another, softer side of, possibly, the world's most famous and beloved practitioner of British mystery writing. They arrive in a boxed set of two disks, running approximately 257 minutes, with, happily, subtitles, and an interesting feature on Christie's early non-Poirot work.

The series was based on short fiction by Dame Agatha, the mistress of mystery; all the episodes are set in the 1920s and `30's, and do not feature her signature detective Hercule Poirot. However, interestingly enough, they feature some characters that carry over to the Poirot stories, most notably Miss Lemon, Poirot's secretary/assistant, and...

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