Customer Reviews

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We play the entire seventies tape for our 5th and 6th year secondary school students, and we and the students are really enthousiastic.
We had to buy a recorder that can play the American type videos, but it was really worth it.

This video, The Century, America's Time, hosted by ABC
's Peter Jennings, served me well as a U.S. History high school teacher. The reason I liked it so much was because it brought to life in short, 10 minute summaries, key events of the twentieth century. Hosted by Peter Jennings, it had a much more contemporary feel to it than similar historical summaries. The narration was snappier and held the attention of my students better than let's say a PBS or other History channel type visual documentary. It supplement's any Twentieth Century U.S. History course because it capture's the emotional context that a text-book cannot reveal. I found my students had a much better grasp of the times when I supplemented the text with these visual snapshots of key events during the century. Because key events are broken down into 10-20 minute segments, it lends itself to the attention span of classroom students and instruction very well. Most documentaries go on for 45 minutes straight on one topic. This was extremely well done. If I had only 1 video series to pick from to capture the flavor of the twentieth century, this is the one I would buy!

History can be an incredible story, and in this documentary it is told with gusto, excitement, and great poignancy. Using clever and creative editing, a captivating musical score, excellent archival footage, and Peter Jennings' masterful narration, The Century: America's Time is captivating from start to finish. Highly recommended.

This set is a great overview of some of the most important moments in America's history over the last 100 years. Unlike other similar video series, this one seems to take a look at the larger picture of American history, focusing and piecing together many periods of time and showing how they all interconnect and lead to the next rather than going into great depth on specific events. My only disappointment was that there was not more to watch, as I would have loved to have seen more of the great video clips and images that are part of this series. Some of the video shown is amazing, and really shows the emotion of these moments and brings them more fully to life. Highly recommended, and a great learning tool for those who may initially be uninterested in history.

The footage in this is excellent. I use segments from nearly every volume in my US history classes. Unfortunately, the closer the tapes get to 1998, the less balanced they become. According to Peter Jennings, the 1980's were a time of AIDS, crack, rap, and explosive homelessness all thanks to the policies of Ronald Reagan. Reagan gets scant mention for his role in ending the Cold War. I had to look at the tape case to see if these tapes were produced by the Democratic National Committee. Much of the rest is excellent. And politics aside, it is fun to watch.

Unlike most similar "documentaries" (CNN's comes to mind), "The Century" isn't just a decade-by-decade grab bag of all the most popular trends, fads, and movies. The approach is thematic; each episode tells the STORY of a chronological section of the past 100 years. Thus, the chapters aren't broken up into meaningless decade chunks, but spans of years that make sense as a "period". It's as much sociology as it is history; the people commenting on times and events are, for the most part, "the common man". When well-known people do show up, they're likely to tell about listening to FDR on the radio when they were children, or wandering the country jobless in the 30's. When movies and other pop culture items are referenced, it's usually in service to the historical theme ("Easy Rider" for the late 60's cultural clash, "The Man In The Gray Flannel Suit" for Eisenhower-era corporate conformity).

The true test of this series for me was its inclusion of the death of Princess Diana in the final chapter. To me, this would seem to be the sign of a lightweight "nostalgia" collection, a "big" event that was meaningless historically and culturally. Yet, they made it work. Placed in the context of the infotainment celebrity-as-religious-icon media overload of the 90's, it made perfect sense; the ultimate global-village celebrity spectacle (not to mention a neat bookend to the century that started with Queen Victoria's death).

Not deep, not exhaustive, but purposeful and well told.

I have showed several of the videos in this set to the students of the high school history class that I teach. My students seem to find the topics very interesting because they are not presented in the usual dry "documentary" fashion. Hint for teachers - The History Channel website (that also sells this video for twice the price) has a great study guide to go along with this set that includes vocabulary words and discussion topics!

I love history. It fascinates me, but especially American history, especially the 20th century. This school year, I have taken a unique, new course at my school, titled: 20th Century World. As a teaching tool, my teacher has shown the movie for each decade whenever we've started that decade as our next unit. Even the kids who usually sleep through class sit and watched it with great interest. It makes you feel like you're there. For example, yesterday we watched the video for the 80s. Through the segment about AIDS and gays, my entire class was sitting there saying, "Ohmygosh, I never knew it was that bad." or "That is so sad." Through every decade, The Century: America's Time has offered a personal touch to every event, instead of making it boring. Every event mentioned on this documentary has affected our life today, and this documentary actually makes you think about how it has.

This is an excellent recap of the century. For young viewers and those who have lived through it. The first video is about the early years and the end of 1890's. Each segment is divided into sections the first one also is about World War I. The second is about 1923-36 and hitler 35-41. The third volume is about homeforont war and the years after The 50's and 60's are covered together in the fourth. The seventies is covered in the fifth The Sixth set up the 1980's and 90's and beyond. The narrative is easy to understand and the clips are edited to run smoothly as a story. Great.

After seeing bits on TV I knew I wanted to own this series. I finally received it as a gift. I wish I had asked for socks! The archival footage was excellent. Add to that the interviews of real people who were witnesses to 20th century events, and you have the makings of a great documentary. However, the title should have been "The Century of America's Evils." Almost the entire series is made up of the ills of America, especially of white males. Apparently, Jennings believes the main point of WWII is that Americans bombed civilians. How does one show events in Tiennamen square in 1989 and not show the man staring down the tanks? The tanks were shown but not the brave people who stood against tyranny. The video spent much time on Jimmy Carter's struggle with the Iranian Hostage situation. Jennings notes that the hostages were released at the moment Reagan was sworn in, but does not tell why they were released at that moment. The fall of the Soviet Union is, apparently, entirely Gobachev's doing. I wish Mr. Jennings had a prouder, yet still realistic, view of this great century. I wish I had asked for socks instead of this video. Save your money, get the History Channel.