Average Rating: 
Rating: - Stunning - as entertaining as it is informative
If you are like me, you tried taping these wonderful episodes when they were aired on PBS years ago and kept botching up the job (I kept forgetting to turn on the tapes on time after the pledge drive interruptions). So, despite enjoying the episodes, you have done without the complete set for years. Well, do yourself a favor and treat yourself to a handomsely packaged, complete copy of this classic documentary about perhaps the seminal event in our nation's history.Most of you who are reading this have seen at least a portion of this film and are familiar with Burns' documentary style. He uses top actors to record written or spoken words of his participants (for example, Sam Waterston does a great job with Lincoln), and he interposes those voices over photographs of the speaker, battlefield maps and photographs (modern and classic), while playing period music or battle sounds in the background. The music is perfect for the occasion, and lingers in your head for days after watching any of the tapes. There are no reenactments like in other documentaries of war, but oddly the battles and participants seem to come to life more authentically using Burns' technique. Then, periodically, he inserts video commentary by leading historians to provide some background information, or to put the action in context. Shelby Foote is primarily used, and his sage commentary led me to read his masterpiece three part Narrative History of the Civil War, but others are interviewed as well including Stephen Oates, biographer of Lincoln (With Malice Toward None), etc. All in all, the series is a stunning achievement, which captivated the attention of the public toward the war between the states while revolutionizing the method of making documentaries of pre-film historical events. There are occasional misses, like the repeated close-up interviewing of a 100+ year old African American woman in the Gettysburg tape whose commentary is hardly legible. However, I respectfully disagree with those reviewers who chide Burns for not spending enough time on the events and political struggles leading up to the conflict - these are powerful and important issues to be sure, but they are outside the scope, budget, and timeframe of this project. Some of the same reviewers have said Burns also ignored some of the "less important" conflicts, like the war in the west. Well, what (other than the 100 yr old woman interviews) would you cut out? Or should the film be 20 hours long instead of 11? It's like making a film on reconstruction, and suggesting that it didn't have enough material on the end of the war. This is an 11 hour film on the war, and I think it succeeds on every level. It's worth twice the price.
Rating:  - Best Civil War documentary TELEVISION has done, but...
While Ken Burns did a MUCH better job than most Television documentaries on the Civil War, it is far from perfect. It has a bias -- that the war was almost entirely about slavery. While slavery was a Key Issue, Burns elevates it.There are other problems. The Myth that Robert E. Lee never referred to the Union as "the enemy" is perpetuated. Yet even in one section of the documentary Lee is quoted as saying "the enemy is there..." which begs the question. There are numerous factual errors. The film states that over 100,000 Union soldiers were under the age of 16 (it was closer to 1,000) and even gets the age of Lincoln at his death wrong. Nitpicking? Perhaps, but these are easily checked facts. Burns also seems to have used as one of his principle guides to the period the writer Shelby Foote. Foote is a good writer (and looks every bit the perfect figure on TV) but is NOT a historian. In short, don't use this as your only reference point.
Rating: - View The Civil War With New Eyes!
First of all, I DO NOT ENJOY DOCUMENTARIES! Or at least I thought I didn't. But Ken Burns' documentary of the Civil War was so realistic and moving, that I had to tear myself away from the television. The music and the photographs really make the Civil War come to life before your very eyes. Two words that make this film worth watching: Shelby Foote. His stories and insights make him seem as if he were sitting in the room with you discussing the Civil War. If you had no interest in The War Between the States before seeing this film, you will after. I would recommend this set of videos to anyone: history buff or not!
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