I first watched The Civil War when I was 8 or 9 and never since. On watching it this time, I am amazed I still remember some of it; it obviously had a big impression on me.

This documentary is an important landmark – kind of like the American version of Shoah – the first long-form American documentary about American history. And it’s also iconic – so much of what is contained in this film has become cliche but that’s not because it is cliche, just that Burns’ style has weaseled its way into American documentary storytelling, especially in the case of TV documentaries. Watch any PBS documentary or basically any American documentary about the past, and there will be some aspect of the style of The Civil War.

The film does have its problems; it relies too much on hearsay and on mythology. A more accurate, less poetic history of the Civil War wouldn’t give us so many anecdotes. But part of the film’s power is this mythologizing of this truly central event in American history. It may not be entirely accurate, but it is more compelling from a narrative point of view. Also, something this long and large, based on something that occurred nearly a century and a half prior, necessarily has to rely at least a little bit on legends. I don’t think the film is lesser for it.