"The Second World War brought out the best and the worst in a generation...."

One of the most amazing things about the synergy between technology and marketing in the 21st Century is how quickly legitimate (as opposed to bootleg) DVDs of truly successful theatrical movies and television shows are released.

Before the advent of the Digital Video Disc format, only underperforming films or shows went quickly from their theatrical/television "runs" to videotape or laserdisc, while the really good "stuff" had a waiting period that ranged from six months to about a year before fans could go to Blockbuster or their favorite music/video store to rent or buy.

Now, as amazing as it seems, PBS Home Video, in conjunction with Paramount Home Entertainment, has released a six-disc box set of Ken Burns' The War, a seven-part look at World War II from a purely American perspective, telling its story through the eyes of ordinary citizens - some of them in the military, some of them civilians on the home front - caught in the maelstrom of history's greatest clash of arms.

(Even more amazing: As I write this review, the series is still being aired by some PBS stations, usually on Wednesday nights.)

Written by Geoffrey C. Ward (The Civil War) and produced and directed by Burns and Lynn Novick, The War isn't your average Big Picture of the Second World War-type of documentary in the vein of The World at War. Nor is it a documentary that focuses mainly on the politics and strategy of the war except where some mention of it is needed for context.

The War, rather, is an attempt by Burns, Ward, and Novick to tell the intimate story of the nearly four-year involvement of America in World War II through the experiences of people from four geographically distributed towns in the United States - Waterbury, CT, Sacramento, CA, Luverne, MN, and Mobile, AL.

Some, like Corporal Glenn Frazier and P-47 pilot Quentin Aanenson, will see action and witness the horrors of war in such places as Bataan in the Philippines and the skies over Nazi-occupied Western Europe, while others, including Katharine Phillips of Mobile, do everything they can to support the war effort and wait anxiously for news from husbands, brothers, sons, and sweethearts fighting in various battlefields scattered across the globe.

In some ways, Burns' The War follows the narrative template of 1990's The Civil War. Each of the seven episodes begins with a prologue, usually a vignette involving one of the "regular characters" featured in the series, which segues to a general overview of what the episode will cover, then it's on to the main narrative.

Another technique from The Civil War and later documentaries that Burns relies on is "the Ken Burns Effect," in which he uses slow pans in and out over still photographs that, when coupled with the narration, music of the period and battlefield sound effects, counteract the static nature of the graphics and add drama and emotional content.

Of course, there is a great deal of newsreel and combat footage of the traditional "World War II documentary" variety, too. Some, such as snippets shown in Episode 1: A Necessary War - December 1941-December 1942, is familiar; the Pearl Harbor attack sequence even includes bits of John Ford's 1942 "recreation" of the "day of infamy." But quite a bit of the footage has never been seen, and is emotionally searing when coupled with the readings of columns by Luverne's Al McIntosh or letters from soldier "Babe" Ciarlo of Waterbury, who is fighting in his parents' country of origin - Italy - and telling his widowed mother that "I'm fine and the Army is keeping me busy."

Where The War differs from its "elder brother" The Civil War is in the absence of commentary from professional historians, either offscreen as narrators or in on-screen interviews.

Why? Well, as Burns and Novick state in their "Note from the Producers" that is included in the box set:

Above all, we wanted to honor the experiences of those who lived through the greatest cataclysm in human history by providing the opportunity for them to bear witness to their own history. Our film is therefore an attempt to describe, through their eyewitness testimony, what the war was actually like for those who served on the front lines, in the places where the killing and the dying took place, and equally what it was like for their loved ones back home. We have done our best not to sentimentalize, glorify or aestheticize the war, but instead have tried simply to tell the stories of those who did the fighting -- and of their families. In so doing, we have tried to illuminate the intimate, human dimensions of a global catastrophe that took the lives of between 50 and 60 million people -- of whom more than 400,000 were Americans.

Before The War aired for the first time on Sept. 23, 2007, both PBS and Burns came under fire from various Hispanic advocacy groups and other minorities who felt that the wartime experiences of Latinos and Native Americans had been excluded - deliberately, some said. They demanded that the public television network either postpone or cancel the series' broadcast, or add material that covered the contribution made to the war effort by non-whites (other than, of course, the African-American and Japanese-American communities).

At first, Burns and Novick stated that The War was already completed and that they'd worked on it for six years, so no changes were necessary, but they relented and added a few vignettes about Latino and Native American fighting men who fought for their country in World War II. This satisfied some of the critics, but others (including the creator of the comic strip Baldo) still felt a sense of exclusion even after the series began airing.

The box set contains the entire 900-minute long documentary series, which is divided into seven parts within six discs.

Disc 1: Episode One - A Necessary War: December 1941 -December 1942. Special Features: Making THE WAR Featurette, Commentary by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick, Photo Gallery, Biographies, Educational Resources

Disc Two: Episode Two - When Things Get Tough: January 1943-December 1943

Episode Three - A Deadly Calling: November 1943 - June 1944

Disc Three: Episode Four - Pride of Our Nation: June 1944 - August 1944. Special Features: Commentary by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick

Disc Four: Episode Five - FUBAR: September 1944 - December 1944

Disc Five: Episode Six - The Ghost Front: December 1944 - March 1945

Disc Six: Episode Seven: A World Without War: March 1945 - December 1945. Special Features: Exclusive Deleted Scenes, Additional Interviews, Educational Resources

Although The War will not please all viewers (especially foreigners), particularly since its focus is exclusively on the American participation and as such only mentions the war in Russia or the first two years of World War II in passing, this is still a worthwhile project. Considering that Burns had sworn that he'd never do another war-themed documentary after The Civil War, only to change his mind for various (and very valid) reasons, this is perhaps one of the most important and moving historical documentaries made about the war. It humanizes the conflict and corrects some of the most glaring misconceptions held by some young Americans about the war - such as the notion that the U.S. fought against Russia on Germany's side - without going into the "greatest generation" schmaltz popularized by Tom Brokaw's books and Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan.

The War: Major Credits

Directed by
KEN BURNS
LYNN NOVICK
Written by
GEOFFREY C. WARD

Produced by
SARAH BOTSTEIN

Co-Producers
PETER MILLER
DAVID McMAHON

Supervising Film Editor
PAUL BARNES

Episode Editors
PAUL BARNES
ERIK EWERS
TRICIA REIDY

Cinematography
BUDDY SQUIRES

Associate Producers
MEGHAN HORVATH
TAYLOR KRAUSS

Narrated By
KEITH DAVID

With
ADAM ARKIN
BOBBY CANNAVALE
KEVIN CONWAY
TOM HANKS
REBECCA HOLTZ
SAMUEL L. JACKSON
JOSH LUCAS
CAROLYN MCCORMICK
ROBERT WAHLBERG
ELI WALLACH

Original Music Composed and Arranged by
WYNTON MARSALIS

“AMERICAN ANTHEM”
Music and Lyrics
GENE SCHEER
Performed by
NORAH JONES