Veteran's Day Weekend Viewing

Looking for something to watch this Veteran's Day weekend? Here are some recommendations.

1. The Pacific (miniseries, HBO Productions)

What better way to remember our veterans by watching HBO's epic 10 part miniseries, The Pacific? Filmed over a year-long period at an estimated cost of $200 million, The Pacific chronicles the lives of three U.S. Marines during the bitter and vicious fighting across the vast battlefield of the Pacific Theater of Operations.

2. Letters from Iwo Jima (film, Warner Brothers/Dreamworks SKG, 2007)

The flip side of the Pacific War, is this Clint Eastwood-directed and Steven Spielberg-produced film from 2007. Told from the Japanese perspective (with subtitles), the film shows the defense of a tiny atoll near the home Japanese islands.

3. Ken Burns' Civil War (documentary, PBS, 1990/2002 DVD)

The classic documentary on the American Civil War, now available (for us) on DVD.

4. World War I: 1914-1918 (documentary, Films for the Humanities, VHS)

This hour-long documentary covers all the bases for the so-called "War to End All Wars."

5. March of the Bonus Army (documentary, PBS, streaming video)

The poor treatment of U.S. military veterans is nothing new, unfortunately. This important documentary examines the plight of the Bonus Army, World War I veterans that marched on Washington and camped outside of the White House.

We also have a lot of documentaries available on our history film database, American History in Film.