Being Scottish and knowing next to nothing about "America's National Pastime", but with an abiding interest in sports history, I welcomed the chance to watch this exhaustive series on the history of baseball.
I immediately recognised the style used by producer Ken Burns in his earlier, acclaimed history of the US Civil War, relating the events in sequential order, using actors to voice- over quotations by unavailable deceased participants, inserting mini-chapters to break up the narrative and piqué interest, playing background music of the times in which they occurred but most of all involving the excellent speaking voice of John Chancellor as narrator to add gravitas to proceedings.
I must admit to some reservations about just how seriously some of the "talking heads" take the game, every episode opening with some invariably pretentious metaphor by some historian, writer, poet, even a politician (New York Mayor Mario Cuomo) and a popular comedian (Billy Crystal), relaying some important-to-them life-changing childhood memory of the game and making various claims on the game being some metaphor for life, American society or something more important (!).
Hey fellas it's only a game although I do admit that within its history there were some fascinating events, especially to an outsider like me, interweaving social history into the story, particularly the colour bar, the "reserve clause" employed by club owners restricting the employment rights of players and nearer the end of the series, the issue of drug-taking amongst players.
Obviously the early episodes, with the lack of film footage rely more on stills photography and voice-overs but these are seamlessly stitched into the whole although it was great to witness some of the biggest events in the sport's history on film, like "The Hit That Shook The World", Hank Aaron's record Home Run hit, Willie Mays' great catch in the World Series, "the greatest game" in the 1975 World Series, likewise the back-stories of great players (not always great men) like Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Ted Williams, Joe DiMaggio and Jackie Robinson, the latter unquestionably a great man.
There is a sense of the producer speeding through the latter years perhaps because the passage of time hasn't added the necessary lustre to such recent events and of course I'll never know just how selective and unbiased, however unintentional the selection of items was for inclusion.
Nevertheless, I found myself completely immersed in this excellently put together documentary series and only wish that a similarly skillful and authoritative history could be applied to other sports, like golf, tennis etc, perhaps with just a little less moralising along the way.
I immediately recognised the style used by producer Ken Burns in his earlier, acclaimed history of the US Civil War, relating the events in sequential order, using actors to voice- over quotations by unavailable deceased participants, inserting mini-chapters to break up the narrative and piqué interest, playing background music of the times in which they occurred but most of all involving the excellent speaking voice of John Chancellor as narrator to add gravitas to proceedings.
I must admit to some reservations about just how seriously some of the "talking heads" take the game, every episode opening with some invariably pretentious metaphor by some historian, writer, poet, even a politician (New York Mayor Mario Cuomo) and a popular comedian (Billy Crystal), relaying some important-to-them life-changing childhood memory of the game and making various claims on the game being some metaphor for life, American society or something more important (!).
Hey fellas it's only a game although I do admit that within its history there were some fascinating events, especially to an outsider like me, interweaving social history into the story, particularly the colour bar, the "reserve clause" employed by club owners restricting the employment rights of players and nearer the end of the series, the issue of drug-taking amongst players.
Obviously the early episodes, with the lack of film footage rely more on stills photography and voice-overs but these are seamlessly stitched into the whole although it was great to witness some of the biggest events in the sport's history on film, like "The Hit That Shook The World", Hank Aaron's record Home Run hit, Willie Mays' great catch in the World Series, "the greatest game" in the 1975 World Series, likewise the back-stories of great players (not always great men) like Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Ted Williams, Joe DiMaggio and Jackie Robinson, the latter unquestionably a great man.
There is a sense of the producer speeding through the latter years perhaps because the passage of time hasn't added the necessary lustre to such recent events and of course I'll never know just how selective and unbiased, however unintentional the selection of items was for inclusion.
Nevertheless, I found myself completely immersed in this excellently put together documentary series and only wish that a similarly skillful and authoritative history could be applied to other sports, like golf, tennis etc, perhaps with just a little less moralising along the way.