Search - Victory at Sea - The Legendary World War II Documentary (History Channel) on DVD

Still Greatest WWII Naval Documentary

Boatman | NJ | 02/16/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This is a vintage series created when TV was in its infancy and sound recording much simpler than today. However, a great deal of the battle photography is unsurpassed.



No series brings together so much authentic warefare footage from the naval dimension of WWII. Editor Isaac Kleinerman worked with what would be considered a shoestring budget and primitive equipment by today's standards. But he did a spectacular job of retrieving and assembling archival footage. Some of the camera operators were right in the line of fire or on the burning decks. Some scenes show vast panoramas of ships the world will never see again. V at S also does justice to the supply and logistics side of the conflict, which too many fictional and documentary accounts ignore.



Some portions are dramatizations or staged, but these are less obtrusive or contrived than half of what the History Channel or our Pentagon puts out these days.



The only thing really missing from V at S is interview or narative support from sailors, merchantmen, and commanders who were still alive and whose memories were fresh. However, this documentary technique did not really become standard until the 1970s. The Salomon / Hanser script, read by Leonard Graves, fits the style of the period, and can be appreciated accordingly. It would not (and could not) be done the same today. But this is no more a detraction than to say that Hollywood can do no real remake of any classic.



People who ask for a digital "restoration" of the sound are mistaken to think there is a Richard Rodgers score for each episode and sequence. There never was. Rodgers wrote some excellent pieces of music, some of which were released in mono and stereo albums over the years. However, the series soundtrack required substantial arrangment and improvisation. Robert Russell Bennett, the NBC Orchestra conductor, with some studio experts, had to make lots of adaptation and write in things Rodgers did not.



Don't anyone forget that, even today, the sound of most feature and documentary films is 80% or more a product of studio mixing, imagination, and ad ons. Some of it is "faithful," but little comes staight from on scene mics in sync with a camera. When V at S came out, audiences were less spoiled by the sorts of audio enhancements now standard, and film people knew that none of the original field footage had on-location sound anyway.

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An absolute disgrace!

Hannibal | Los Angeles, CA USA | 03/13/2004

(1 out of 5 stars)

"I bought this great documentary and was appalled by what I saw AND TRIED TO LISTEN TO. The makers of this DVD should immediately issue a refund to all who have purchased this disgraceful production. It is simply inconceivable in this day and age that a product so sloppy and horribly mixed could be issued to the public. Even a child could do a better job of equalizing the sound levels between the almost-inaudible narration and the overpowering music. SHAME ON ALL CONNECTED WITH THIS ABORTION. How ironic that I myself waited so long for the DVDs to come out (rather than buy the videos) so that I would be able to maximize the pleasures I remembered from the series in the 50's, and my reward was probably the most absymal DVDs ever issued by so-called "professionals". It would be fitting if they were never ever allowed to practice their non-existant skills again and were condemned to listen to this audio atrocity for eternity."