Bill Moyers A World Of Ideas: Writers (1988 1990/Acorn Media DVD Set)
Picture: C Sound: C Extras: C+ Episodes: B
In one of
his finest shows ever, Bill Moyers A
World Of Ideas: Writers has the great journalist asking questions of some of
the most important writers of his time and all time. They include Chinua Achebe, E.L. Doctorow,
M.F.K. Fisher, Carlos Fuentes, Nadine Gordimer, Jeannette Halen, Joseph Heller,
Toni Morrison (two parts), Bharati Mukherjee, Derek
Walcott, August Wilson, Tom Wolfe (two parts) and a striking two-part piece
with Issac Asimov comprise the 16 main hour-long shows. Segments from his hit
TV series NOW include Barbara
Kingsolver, Arundhati Roy, Laura Restrepo, Doris Lessing, Isabel Allende and
Alice Walker, while Bill Moyers Journal pieces include Maxine Hong Kingston and
Louise Erdrich.
There was
a time when it was expected that all interviews and journalism were this smart,
good, important and advanced, but the kind of dumbing down we have seen on TV
since (ironically) the late 1980s has made this kind of a show a classic. Moyers is very smart (like Charlie Rose
since, for instance) and it is a shame we dont see or hear more intelligent
interviews with writers or anybody else today.
Despite the Internet and its reach, it has had the opposite effect of
offering more such intelligent discourse.
That is why this is a key DVD set and one really worth going out of your
way for. Yes, it is dated in spots, but
that does not hurt it in the least. It
is worth going out of your way for.
The 1.33
X 1 image was shot on analog NTSC videotape and is on the soft side throughout,
so expect the image to be dated and challenging, with haloing and aliasing
errors, while the Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo is simple and shows its age despite
being as from clean a source as possible.
I just wish it was clearer, but it is from a time when TV audio
standards were simple stereo at best and this is common with many sets of TV on
DVD. Text on Moyers, book lists for each writer and updates on those who
participated are included on the DVDs, as well as a 16-page booklet that adds
to the shows are included, but this set also has bonus interviews from various
Moyers shows (as noted above) that are worth seeing after watching the
mini-series episodes.
For more
Moyers DVD releases, try these links:
Joseph Campbell The Power Of
Myth
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/10329/Joseph+Campbell+on+The+Power+of
Genesis: A Living Conversation +
On Faith & Reason
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/10579/Bill+Moyers:+On+Faith+and+Reason
In Search Of The Constitution
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/10785/Bill+Moyers+%E2%80%93+In+Searc
- Nicholas Sheffo
