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The Death of Yugoslavia
1995 · TV series · documentary · 50 min episodes · 1 season
Created by Norma Percy
The Death of Yugoslavia is a BAFTA-award winning BBC documentary series first broadcast in 1995. It covers the collapse of the former Yugoslavia. It is notable in its combination of never-before-seen archive footage interspersed with interviews of most of the main players in the conflict, including Slobodan Milošević, the then President of Serbia. Norma Percy won the 1996 BAFTA TV Award for 'Best Factual Series' for the documentary. However, it has been argued that it presents a potentially slightly biased point-of-view; for instance during the trial of Milošević before the ICTY in The Hague, Judge Bonomy called the nature of much of the commentary "tendentious" (partisan).
4 positivefrom 4 commenters
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6 comments on Hacker News
It's one of my favourite documentaries, almost as good as The Death of Yugoslavia.
For whatever reason YouTube has put age limits on some of the uploads of it, here's the start of one without it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tj9Zw5fN3rE
Today is Srebrenica remembrance day so I'll sneak in a OT link to the BBC documentary The Death of Yugoslavia here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BsBTkAXnPZs
I'd be interested in your take on the UK documentary The Death of Yugoslavia[0], available on YouTube. It gave me the distinct impression that the US didnt have a strategic vision so much as they got unwillingly dragged into it and felt that they had no option but to try and solve it.
As a lay person not from the Balkans, I was impressed that the filmmakers got all the major players to speak candidly, on camera, about their involvement. Mladic, Tudjman, Milosevic, all there for example. Reminded me of another great series, the World At War.[1]
[0] https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL-ur6mGQeTOmuwxnBW-ssXWDD-w5AEH9E&feature=shared
[1] https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLYxy4la9w2tfotW1Xs-7oICGflf4dJtj5&feature=shared
The Death of Yugoslavia (1996) [1] [2]. Won the BAFTA and Peabody awards that year.
It's a BBC documentary in six episodes about the conflict that caused the dissolution of Yugoslavia and the wars in the Balkans.
It stands out among many documentaries for being a truly dispassionate moment-to-moment record of events. No sensationalism, no grand-standing, just the facts.
If you're tired of the Netflix style of documentary — lots of talking heads quickly edited together for sound bites, dramatic music, re-enactments — then this is for you. Sadly, too few documentaries are produced in this style anymore.
Edit: Looks like the episodes are on YouTube [3].
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Death_of_Yugoslavia
[2] https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00gfbpy
[3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tj9Zw5fN3rE&list=PLdw7wnKe0wiUSNdugFGpnSfm6wt-9gvUt
I want more historical documentaries like BBC's amazing The Death of Yugoslavia [1], a minute-by-minute breakdown of the collapse of Yugoslavia and subsequent civil war. It tackles a complex subject in a refreshingly dispassionate and informative way.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Death_of_Yugoslavia
If you like this sort of thing, check out The Death of Yugoslavia [1]. It's an absolutely riveting BBC documentary series, in six parts, about the break-up of Yugoslavia, and about the subsequent wars and conflicts.
I love how how methodical, matter-of-fact and neutral this documentary is (or at least it seems to me); the filmmakers don't take sides, and they work only to explain a series of historical events, portraying all sides equally in the process. The British English narration doesn't hurt, either.
I rather prefer this format over Ken Burns', who turns up the emotional levels with personal "stories", folk music and photographs that look epic and timeless. Unfortunately, among documentarians, Burns' format is much more popular, probably because it's easier to do.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Death_of_Yugoslavia