Written by: Ashtyn at 12:35 pm
Filed under: DVD Box Sets,Network,Television
TV Show Info:
Writer: Various
Director: Various
Cast: Woodrow Wilson, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Richard Nixon, Lyndon Johnson, Harry S Truman, Kennedy, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jimmy Carter
Rating: Not Rated
Studio: PBS
Release Info:
Original Air Dates: Various
DVD Box Set Release Date: August 26, 2008
Online Availability: Amazon for $109.99
Thinking of the upcoming election, it was just about the perfect time for Paramount and PBS to release The Presidents Collection. This huge box set that contains 15 DVDs is going to be great for people interested in history, educational programming, elections and presidents of the past. This set is filled with interesting facts and tidbits of some of our most hated and adored presidents. As one might expect, this is perfect for the whole family. Granted, smaller children might not fall in love with this right away, but older kids may find interest in it and it could easily be a wonderful teaching tool for homeschooling families.
The Presidents Collection looks at ten periods of time with the following presidents, Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman, The Kennedys, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, and George H.W. Bush. All of these shows about individual presidents have previously aired on PBS throughout a number of the past years. The earliest aired on PBS back in the early 90s (Lyndon Johnson) and the newest came out this year (George H.W. Bush). The remaining films ran through the 90s and the early 2000s.
Each show is incredibly thorough. In fact, one of the reasons that it took so long to do this review is because I wanted to make sure to watch as many of the specific shows as I could before going through with the review. The smallest DVD in the set belongs to Jimmy Carter and its still close to three hours. Meanwhile, FDR’s DVD comes in at nearly four and a half hours with a wealth of information. These DVDs offer a considerable amount of information you’d want to know about each president profiled and while I did know some of the information that was brought up I learned plenty of new things about each president.
Thinking of the kiddies, my son also really enjoyed this. History is one of his favorite subjects, so he might be a little out of the norm, but he wanted to sit through the majority of the DVDs, which is not always the case when I am reviewing something that I think he will like. He learned a great deal about each president and was able to form a multitude of ideas about what was good and bad about each president in the set. It brought on a lot of questions too, as I expected it would, but considering he is homeschooled, those are the kinds of DVDs I want him to see.
Before getting into the actual plot lines for these DVDs, I just have to say that I was impressed by the amount of clips and interviews that these DVDs had. Even the older presidents in this list had a good deal of pictures, film reels, and surviving family that could provide some more modern day interviews. This really helped to spice up what could have been a somewhat flat set of material.
The Presidents Collection Plot
In nine out of ten cases, each show is going to follow the same format. The majority of the DVDs focus on the legacy that the president of the moment created for himself. This is shown by going through the president’s history and his time in office. Things usually begin on a good note with the defining moment of the president’s term in office. Occasionally, the DVD will start differently, but this is how things work for the most part. Split into somewhat chronological order, you have a chance to see how things were in the life of the president prior to his becoming president and then through the first and possibly second term of his career. The after-career of the president is also discussed.
I couldn’t help but find Jimmy Carter to be one of the most interesting of all of the presidents presented. I suppose one of the reasons why I ended up feeling this way is because I wasn’t expecting to get much out of the Jimmy Carter experience. What I got was information about an inexperienced peanut farmer that went from farming, to preaching door to door, all the way on a path that led him to become a legend as president. Carter had a controversial career as president that was riddled with debt and the troubles associated with Vietnam. This all translates to some incredible DVD footage of his life and career.
The most interesting president in this set, for me, had to be FDR. His life is filled with pictures and despite his age and the length of time it has been since he was president, the material for his life held up remarkably well. It transfers over beautifully on these discs. I could be biased, considering I have always found FDR to be one of the most interesting presidents, but still there is plenty of good information to be found here. Likewise, The Kennedys DVD was extremely interesting and informative, and not just because of the long public history that the family holds.
If we are considering the downside of The Presidents Collection then we need to look at all of the things that were left out. I found the fact that Dan Quayle was left out of the George H.W. Bush DVD was rather odd, considering he was the vice president. Still, the instances of excellence far outweigh the bad or odd things, which appear few and far between. It is nice to see the honesty that comes with discussing the botched presidencies of Bush and the other presidents that have a longstanding tarnished reputation.
PBS went all out with these DVDs in terms of content. It will be nice to see the others in the set, should they decide to release those in a collection in the future. The others include Eisenhower, Gerald Ford, John Adams, Lincoln, and Ulysses S. Grant.
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Audio/Visual:
Considering these DVDs were all once shown on television and were made through a span of close to 20 years it is incredibly hard to gauge something like video. Some of the video is dated, but it looks good for its age. Nothing looks truly bad, but some of it does look like it’s close to 20 years old. There are minor compression errors at times, a little noise here and there, but for the most part the video you find here in this set will be comparable to what you would have seen on television the year that the DVD was released. Additionally, nothing was so bad that it hindered the viewing experience.
As for the audio, all of the discs are available in Dolby Digital 2.0, with exception to Bush, which comes in 5.1. I didn’t have too many problems with the audio. Occasionally, the need for volume toggling would come up, but for the most part things sounded decent. Closed Captioning is available on each disc.
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Bonus Features:
The Presidents Collection does not offer very many special features. Homeschooling parents will simply love the PDF teacher’s guides that come with each President DVD. Of course, if you’re not homeschooling and didn’t buy this for educational purposes, this will be fairly useless to you.
Some special features that could benefit everyone are found on The Kennedys disc. This set includes a Kennedy Family Tree, and two longer features, “JFK’s Hidden Life: An Interview with Robert Dallek” and “An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy 1917-1963″.
Additionally, the Woodrow Wilson discs include an Enhanced Version, which offers an additional hour and thirty minutes of video, interviews with scholars and filmmakers, a WWI poster gallery, photo galleries, and a scholar’s forum on Wilson’s legacy.
It would have been nice to see some additional special features for the presidents that were left behind, but all in all these DVDs are filled with substance, especially if one of the discs is about one of your favorite presidents.
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Bottom Line:
The Presidents Collection is a bit pricey but it is definitely worth the purchase. This would be perfect for a Christmas gift or a special gift for that history lover in your life. Each DVD is filled with insightful information and remains interesting long after the first time it is watched. This one is perfect for the whole family, whether you are using it for entertainment, historical information, or educational purposes.
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Technorati Tags: PBS, Paramount, The Presidents Collection, Nixon, FDR, The Kennedys, Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush, Reagan, Documentary, Biopic, Educational, TV on DVD, DVD Box Set Review
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Written by Ashtyn - Visit Website
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Ashtyn Evans is a writer, advocate, free thinker, and all around cynical person. Always quick to find the negative in anything pop culture, she loves being a part of that which she despises. Ashtyn and Dominick own numerous blogs together, as well as a full-time writing business. In her spare time she is a full-time college student studying History and Psychology. She plans to one day give up her freelance career and be a full-time blogger, novelist, and domestic goddess. She can be contacted for writing projects, fan mail, or just to say hi. She really is friendlier than we make her look.
