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Ken Burns

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This article is about the director. For the musician, see Kenneth C. Burns.
Ken Burns
Born
Kenneth Lauren Burns
Height000 cm (00 in)
Spouse(s)Julie Deborah Brown (2003-present)
Amy Stechler Burns (1982-1993)

Kenneth Lauren Burns (born July 29 1953) is an American director and producer of documentary films known for his style of making use of archival footage and photographs. Among his most notable productions are The Civil War (1990), Baseball (1994), Jazz (2001) and The War (2007).

Burns's documentaries have been nominated for two Academy Awards (Brooklyn Bridge in 1982 and The Statue of Liberty in 1986) and have won seven Emmy Awards.

Biography

Burns was born in Brooklyn, New York City, and went on to graduate from Pioneer High School in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1975, and went on to be one of the co-founders of Florentine Films.[1] The recipient of more than 20 honorary degrees, Burns is a sought-after public speaker, appearing at colleges, civic organizations and business groups throughout the country. Burns currently resides in Walpole, New Hampshire with his wife, Julie. He endorses Barack Obama in the 2008 presidential race.[2]

Burns' brother, Ric Burns, is also a noted documentary filmmaker.

Career

Ken Burns Effect

Main article: Ken Burns Effect

In common use with the makers of documentaries on subjects where principally still material is available, Burns often gives life to still photographs by slowly zooming in on subjects of interest and panning from one subject to another. For example, in a photograph of a baseball team, he might slowly pan across the faces of the players and come to rest on the player the narrator is discussing.

This effect, present in many professional and home software applications, was affectionately named "The Ken Burns Effect" in Apple Inc.'s iPhoto and iMovie software applications. It also figures in the 6th generation iPod interface with this effect on the cover art of the main menu.

The Civil War

Main article: The Civil War (documentary)

Of Burns's many film series, The Civil War is generally considered to be his masterpiece. Narrated by Pulitzer Prize winning author David McCullough, Burns filled in many other roles, serving as director, producer, co-writer, chief cinematographer, music director and executive producer of The Civil War. The series has been honored with more than 40 major film and television awards, including two Emmy Awards, two Grammy Awards, Producer of the Year Award from the Producers Guild of America, People's Choice Award, Peabody Award, duPont-Columbia Award, D.W. Griffith Award, and the US$50,000 Lincoln Prize, among dozens of others. The nine episodes explore the Civil War through personal stories and photos that create a very different kind of experience from watching nearly any other modern movie today. During the creation of the movie Burns filmed thousands of archived photographs. This resulted in the coining of the aforementioned term the “Ken Burns Effect”. The Civil War has been viewed by more than 40 million people.

The War

"The War", 15 hours in length and seven years in the making, tells the story of the Second World War from the personal perspective of the men and women from four geographically distributed American towns: Waterbury, CT; Mobile, AL; Sacramento, CA; and Luverne, MN. Airing in the fall of 2007, it was the most watched series in the last ten years on PBS. One hundred and seventeen PBS stations across the nation participated in some form of community outreach (local documentaries, screenings, workshops, etc.) and nearly 30,000 educator guides went to every high school in the country. As was hoped, "The War" started a massive national dialog about this most cataclysmic event in the history of the United States.

Prior to its premiere, the film came under criticism because the version first available for preview made no mention of the contributions of Hispanics in the war, and as many as half a million Hispanics fought in World War II. The film did focus specifically on Japanese Americans, as they were rounded up and sent to internment camps; and it did address the reality that African American soldiers were forced to fight in segregated units. Although no one of Hispanic origin had come forward in any of the four towns when Burns put the word out looking for interviewees, Burns responded to this concern by adding three additional interviews, two with Hispanic veterans and one with a Native American veteran.

  • An episode of the 1990s HBO sketch comedy series "Mr. Show" featured a video mockumentary entitled "The Civil War: The Reenactments" in an obvious parody of Burns' "Civil War."
  • In an episode of The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius where Jimmy and his friends travel to Egypt, his classmates are watching a "97 hour-long documentary about Egypt by Ken Burns."
  • In The Simpsons episode "Pray Anything", Homer inadvertently watches a documentary by, about, and named for Ken Burns due to his inability to find his television remote.
  • Mystery Science Theater 3000 Episode 0805 The Thing That Couldn't Die segment four: Crow T. Robot produces a Civil War documentary, at once elaborate and hastily thrown together. Reminded that Ken Burns has already made a Civil War documentary, he states: "Oh, but was it about the Civil War?"[3]
  • The band Stars Like Fleas have released an album called "The Ken Burns Effect" in 2008.

Filmography

Under Burns' name

  • The West (1996) (Executive Producer, Directed by Steven Ives)

Short Films

References

  1. ^ Hal Erickson. "Ken Burns biography". All Movie Guide. Retrieved 2007-06-09.
  2. ^ The Swamp: Once neutral, filmmaker Ken Burns picks Obama
  3. ^ Chaplin, Paul . "Episode 805- The Thing that Couldn't Die"
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