X
- 2017
- TV-MA
- PBS
- 2017
- TV-MA
- PBS
Summary Ken Burns and Lynn Novick returns with a 10-part, 18-hour miniseries about the war features interviews, archival footage, home movies, photos, and audio clips.
- 2017
- TV-MA
- PBS
- 2017
- TV-MA
- PBS
The Vietnam War
Season 1 Premiere: Sep 17, 2017
8.3
Where to Watch
Summary Ken Burns and Lynn Novick returns with a 10-part, 18-hour miniseries about the war features interviews, archival footage, home movies, photos, and audio clips.
Where to Watch
All Seasons
Top Cast
Metascore
Universal Acclaim
Based on 19 Critic Reviews
90
100% Positive
19 Reviews
19 Reviews
0% Mixed
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Metascore
Universal Acclaim
Based on 19 Critic Reviews
90
100% Positive
19 Reviews
19 Reviews
0% Mixed
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
All of it folds together into an immersive and wrenching creation that left me genuinely curious as to whether viewers will have the stamina to spend several nights in a row with the series. Certainly watching The Vietnam War is one of the most worthwhile ways to spend time with your television this fall. Just as certainly, committing to doing so will wear a person out.
User Score
Universal Acclaim
Based on 74 User Ratings
8.3
86% Positive
64 Ratings
64 Ratings
3% Mixed
2 Ratings
2 Ratings
11% Negative
8 Ratings
8 Ratings
User Score
Universal Acclaim
Based on 74 User Ratings
8.3
86% Positive
64 Ratings
64 Ratings
3% Mixed
2 Ratings
2 Ratings
11% Negative
8 Ratings
8 Ratings
One of the finest documentaries ever made
Described by the show's official website as "an immersive 360-degree narrative," The Vietnam War is a behemoth in every sense of the word; written by historian Geoffrey C. Ward and directed by celebrated documentarians Ken Burns and Lynn Novick, the series cost $30 million to make, and was in production for over ten years, with the ten episodes running to a gargantuan eighteen hours. Assembled from over 24,000 photos and 1,500 hours of archive footage, the show features interviews with 79 people, including analysts, bureaucrats, journalists, artists, anti-war protestors, draft dodgers, conscientious objectors, deserters, Gold Star family members, and American, South Vietnamese, and North Vietnamese troops. Deliberately eschewing interviews with historians and major polarising figures such as Jane Fonda, John Kerry, or Oliver Stone, the series features what Burns and Novick define as a "ground up" approach; concentrating almost exclusively on the experiences of ordinary people and soldiers from every side.
Beginning with the French invasion of Indochina in 1858 and concluding with the opening of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in 1982 (although some brief postscript material goes up to President Barak Obama's visit to Vietnam in 2016), the series hits all the beats you'd expect within this timeframe, but where the show excels is not in trying to present an all-inclusive summary of everything that happened in the war, but in its mixture of the macro and the micro - intercut into the larger framework of political analysis and military assessment are more relatable and personalised interviews, which serve to reinforce what the war was like for the people who actually fought it and their families back home. These human stories serve as Burns and Novick's "ground up" material, helping to contextualise the less personal socio-political canvas against which they are set.
A major theme throughout the series is the effect the war had on the American psyche. Whilst the first episode outlines how the US emerged from World War II as world leaders, convinced of its own irrefutable morality, and proud of its self-appointed role as global law enforcer, later episodes detail how all of this changed during the war. Fought in a country few Americans had even heard of, and fewer still knew anything about, the war was a conflict whose ultimate futility at so great a cost was unlike anything any living American had seen. The stain of the war lingered for decades, and lingers still. As the documentary lays bare, Vietnam fundamentally redefined the notion of American patriotism, altered the American zeitgeist, and undermined American exceptionalism.
Another vital theme, but one which is left for the viewer to provide the connective tissue, is how the domestic events of the war are mirrored in contemporary American society. Undoubtedly, the war was the most divisive period in the US since the Civil War. However, the most divisive period since the war is right now; the US is currently in the seventeenth year of a war begun under dubious circumstances; there are accusations of foreign collusion in a US election; the president has threatened to use force against an Asian nation; there are mass demonstrations across the country; the White House is obsessed with leaks, with three different presidents attempting to undermine the media in a manner not dissimilar to Trump's catchphrase of "fake news."
However, the series is not perfect. The most obvious criticism is that despite their claims that all sides are represented equally, there is an imbalance between the anti-war movement (represented by three interviewees and dozens of vets), and those who supported the war (represented by a few comments here and there from people who admit they were conflicted). This imbalance is also present in the number of North Vietnamese combatants (14) weighed against the number of South Vietnamese combatants (7). There are also some notable, and oftentimes bizarre, omissions. For example, there is no mention whatsoever of Maj Gen Edward Lansdale, LTC John Paul Vannor Lê Van Vien (aka Bay Vien).
Nevertheless, The Vietnam War is an undeniably epic achievement. Burns and Novick have distilled down a massively complex canvas, whilst at the same time refusing to placate either side. This refusal leaves the series open to criticism from both sides, but it may also be the show's greatest strength. Rather than submitting to partisan politics, the series follows its own path, irrespective of how it appears to those with preconceived notions. Harrowing and insightful, informative and disturbing, conciliatory rather than condemnatory, The Vietnam War is a masterpiece.
Report
This is a phenomenal movie that details the beginning and ending of the vietnam war in excruciating detail that questions why we even went into the war in the first place.
Report
A powerfully affecting elegy to a turbulent time. [18 Sep - 1 Oct 2017, p.26]
Hour for hour, it’s one of the best things I’ve seen on TV this year--but because it frequently comes so close to becoming not just impressive but important, challenging, even agenda-setting. But it never quite pushes itself over that line.
But for all the documentary's merits, it does its best work in ferreting out the bite-size experiences of the grunts, not just the ones in uniform but the CIA officers, junior diplomats, peasant farmer and family members back home—the people didn't make policy but were whipsawed by it. Their stories are poignant, confusing, heartbreaking, maddening, blackly funny, or cryptic, often all at once.
While not quite a documentary war of attrition, Ken Burns and Lynn Novick's The Vietnam War stretches over 10 nights and 18 hours, and even though you feel that length at every turn, the series is meant to wear you down. And yet it's impossible to look away.
The strength of The Vietnam War comes from these 80-odd interviewees, who offer a glimpse into the psyches of people on all sides of the conflict--from reluctant American draftees to enthusiastic North Vietnamese recruits. ... At times, the length of The Vietnam War detracts from its appeal. Even with the headings, it can be hard to keep the years and offensives straight.
When I started it more than a year ago I didn't finish it. Although I have seen quite long documentaries over the years this one overwhelmed me by the amount of material and information. Especially since what I knew about the Vietnam War was pretty basic.
Today I finished the last two chapters, basically almost 4 long hours but incredibly well done.
It's not a perfect documentary but it's very close.
Needless to say, for the amount of time you have to spend, you need patience, desire and will to absorb the information and above all to be really interested in the subject but I tell you it's unquestionably worth it.
Report
Une série trop longue (9 épisodes d’une cinquantaine de minutes) et beaucoup trop bavarde pour réellement convaincre ; en matière de documentaire, c’est assez rédhibitoire ! Ainsi, bien des longueurs et des répétitions entraînent un étonnant ennui de la part d’un conflit qui a connu les rebondissements les plus invraisemblables et les plus palpitants qui soient … quelle ironie d’en avoir fait un truc aussi ramolli !
C’est très scolaire d’un bout à l’autre et ça manque de neutralité ici et là ; les interviews des rescapés et/ou intervenants sont souvent maladroites ; les images d’archives sont souvent décevantes et déjà vues et revues ; la plupart du temps, la série ne fait que se perdre d’une part dans le psycho-dépressif et d’autre part dans son agenda très chargé de justice sociale à la Caliméro, clairement pro-communiste.
Heureusement, il reste la clarté de l’ensemble et son aspect didactique assez efficace (c’est scolaire…) et un dernier épisode en forme d’épilogue qui semble (enfin !) maîtriser son sujet. Mais trop peu, trop **** en somme pour une série qui s’est enlisée, elle aussi, dans le bourbier des Viets et de la propagande d’extrême-gauche.
Report
Production Company:
- ARTE
- Florentine Films
- PBS Pictures
- Public Broadcasting Service (PBS)
- The Vietnam Film Project
- WETA
Initial Release Date: Sep 17, 2017
Number of seasons: 1 Season
Rating: TV-MA
Genres:
Awards
Primetime Emmy Awards
• 4 Nominations
Critics' Choice Documentary Awards
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
AFI Awards, USA
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
