Witness Events Of The 20th Century - Bizarre Cults details
| Format: | Ex DVD |
|---|---|
| Starring: | Sir David Frost |
| Genre: | Documentary |
| Studio: | SONY DADC |
| Name | Discs | |
|---|---|---|
Witness Events Of The 20th Century - Bizarre Cults |
Ex Feature |
DVD Information
| Rental release: | 16 Aug 2004 |
|---|---|
| Main languages: | English |
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Most helpful review
Laughable Production - Cant Take It Seriously
By a customer from Chesterfield , 09 Nov 2005[Highly rated reviewer]
Imagine if some 6th Form students had been given a camcorder and some old equipment for a day and told to make a documentary about cults. The results would be similar to this: (1) Someone just slapped in a 'Greatest Classical Hits' CD (the kind you can buy from a motorway service station for 8 quid) and hit 'play'. Sometimes the narrator is nearly drowned out by louder parts! (2) The pictures often don't fit with the narration. For example, 2 minutes after talking about a letter from NASA (and having moved onto a different topic) a letter from NASA appears on the screen! And while talking about America, we see the German Chancellor walking thru a crowd in Germany...a minute later, the narrator talks about Germany (luckily the pictures are still related to Germany at this point!) (3) I have never seen such annoying titles. They appear one letter at a time as tho someone is typing them, but they often fade away before the typist has finished! You will see 'T...h...e.....O...p...i...n...i..o.n....
O...f......F...r..a' then the words fade away! (4) Those of you who enjoy a retro experience will appreciate that the content has been copied from a knackered old video tape. You will be able to enjoy again a fuzzy picture, muffled sound and a large 'wobble' when the cassette recorder loses its tracking.
(5) Finally, the content itself is just 'What' and 'When' not 'Why'. By which I mean, the narrator just reads out the facts of what happened and when for each cult, but there is no analysis beyond '...and the debate as to why this happened continues, to this day.' We jump about from cult to cult with no attempt to explain what causes these beliefs to spread or what these cults have in commmon. This DVD is so bad you could watch better quality programming on one of the Sky TV channels. Don't waste your rental slot on this steaming pile!- Was this review helpful to you?
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(2)Laughable Production - Cant Take It Seriously
By a customer from Chesterfield , 09 Nov 2005Imagine if some 6th Form students had been given a camcorder and some old equipment for a day and told to make a documentary about cults. The results would be similar to this: (1) Someone just slapped in a 'Greatest Classical Hits' CD (the kind you can buy from a motorway service station for 8 quid) and hit 'play'. Sometimes the narrator is nearly drowned out by louder parts! (2) The pictures often don't fit with the narration. For example, 2 minutes after talking about a letter from NASA (and having moved onto a different topic) a letter from NASA appears on the screen! And while talking about America, we see the German Chancellor walking thru a crowd in Germany...a minute later, the narrator talks about Germany (luckily the pictures are still related to Germany at this point!) (3) I have never seen such annoying titles. They appear one letter at a time as tho someone is typing them, but they often fade away before the typist has finished! You will see 'T...h...e.....O...p...i...n...i..o.n....
O...f......F...r..a' then the words fade away! (4) Those of you who enjoy a retro experience will appreciate that the content has been copied from a knackered old video tape. You will be able to enjoy again a fuzzy picture, muffled sound and a large 'wobble' when the cassette recorder loses its tracking.
(5) Finally, the content itself is just 'What' and 'When' not 'Why'. By which I mean, the narrator just reads out the facts of what happened and when for each cult, but there is no analysis beyond '...and the debate as to why this happened continues, to this day.' We jump about from cult to cult with no attempt to explain what causes these beliefs to spread or what these cults have in commmon. This DVD is so bad you could watch better quality programming on one of the Sky TV channels. Don't waste your rental slot on this steaming pile!- Was this review helpful to you?
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Home Movie production values but interesting material
By The Christian Review from UK , 06 Aug 2005This is an ITN production from the mid 90's hosted by David Frost, containing stacks of info and pictures on cults (although I couldnt understand how 'Evangelicals' as a whole seemed to be counted among them!). Its the production values that let this disc down. Its obviously a port from a video tape. At one point the disc jumps and crackles just like good old VHS. Also the captions that appear slowly on the screen to describe who is talking dissapear before the sentence is complete! I kid you not. Its a little too fast moving, but by far the most irritating is the soundtrack. For some reason someone at ITN thought it would be nice to play standard classical music and bits of Vangelis type tunes to scenes of mass suicide. It just feels very inappropriate and detracts from the serious atmosphere of the material. That said, its a pretty good and quick overview of a fascinating subject.- Was this review helpful to you?
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