The War On Oranges

Advertising has invaded my daily snack, and I’m disgusted. As I peeled off the little sticker on my orange today I noticed that it looked a little unusual, upon further inspection…it was not the standard sticker, it was in fact an ad for Ken Burns new marathon: The War. I think part of the sour taste in my mouth had to do with prior misgivings about Mr. Burns latest project. In fact, a while back I wrote a pretty long winded blog entry about my thoughts on the movie, that I decided not to post. But now I feel like since they have ruined my daily citrus break, I should be able to voice my opinion. Here is a piece of what I wrote:

Ken Burns latest epic “The War” is premiering this week in Cannes. I am torn on whether or not I have any interest in watching it when it is released here in the states on PBS. Some of you might have been following the latest flap concerning the movie. A bunch of Hispanic activists and politicians have been lobbying for Mr. Burns to re-cut the film, including in it the story of Hispanics and Native Americans who served in the war. I don’t believe this is the right tact to take. After all, Mr. Burns is a story teller, and he is free to tell the story as he sees fit. It does bother me slightly, that in 6 years of work which resulted in 14 hours of film, he didn’t find the story of even one Hispanic or Native American soldier compelling enough to include. He has argued, validly in my opinion, that he has chosen specific towns to highlight, and they did not have large Hispanic populations. I would accept this argument, but there is a problem: Its not the first time he’s left out key contributors in his notoriously long films. In his 18 hour long tribute to baseball, Burns spent 6 minutes on Hispanics. 4 on Roberto Clemente and 2 on all others. This despite the OBVIOUS trends that have taken over the game. According to one article I read: “Burns claimed Sandy Koufax and Bob Gibson were the two dominant pitchers of the 1960s. Juan Marichal, the Dominican Hall of Famer who was their main nemesis, did not rate a mention. Marichal had more 20-win seasons and a lower earned run average than Gibson and 86 more career victories than Koufax.” I for one (for personal reasons to be sure) have always been curious about how this country’s newest citizens felt about taking up arms for a country that didn’t (and still doesn’t) know if there was space for them at the table. I guess Mr. Burns didn’t share my curiosity.

I’m not sure what caused me not to post it initially. I think I felt like I couldn’t be a non biased commentator on the subject (plus the fact that I prefer to make you guys laugh, than get your riled up against me). As I said, Mr. Burns is the story teller here, and since he is the one that choose to tell it he should tell the story he thinks is the most compelling. It should be added that after the fit thrown and the Cannes release, but prior to its US release, Mr. Burns went back and added the story of several Hispanic and Native American soldiers. I've heard it felt very "added-on" whatever that means, and I've yet to see the final product, in either form. However, I know for a fact that his movie would have been lessor for not including the stories of people like my Abuelito: A Purple Heart recipient who fought at the Rhine and in Central Europe. The only nights he spent away from his wife, were those nights he fought in the war. He never spoke about his experiences to his children, but when he died we found out that he had carried his discharge papers in his wallet for almost 60 years. We’ll never know his whole story. A gifted story teller, I bet Mr. Burns could have told it beautifully.

Mi Abuelito: Jose P. Martinez