Ken Burns
Documentary Filmmaker
Born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1953, Ken Burns is a Peabody Award-winning documentary filmmaker whose career spans over 30 years. His first film, "Brooklyn Bridge," was nominated for an Academy Award in 1981. He was the director, producer, co-writer, chief cinematographer, music director, and executive producer of the groundbreaking documentary "The Civil War," the highest-rated series in the history of American public television. His other major films include "Baseball," "The West," "Jazz," and "The War." His most recent film, "The National Parks: America's Best Idea," premiered on PBS in 2009.
The digital revolution has made filmmaking technologies available to the masses. But the idea that it makes us all artists, says Ken Burns, is “bullshit.”
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3 min
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The most effective question he ever asked a subject from behind the camera wasn’t a question at all.
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2 min
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It’s a classic historian’s question, but Ken Burns rejects it, insisting that “human nature is the only given.”
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4 min
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According to Ken Burns, imposing a narrative on the past keeps humans from going crazy—and is an act of love. Critics who find that view tidy and sentimental are revealing […]
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5 min
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Does making a documentary deepen or exhaust Ken Burns’s appreciation of its subject? And does he ever start imagining his life as one of his own films?
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4 min
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Filmmaker Ken Burns describes how he hopes “The National Parks” will succeed both as a topical statement about conservation and a timeless human story.
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6 min
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Inspired by Twain’s own example, the “Mark Twain” documentarian seeks to explore quintessentially American issues of “race and space.”
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7 min
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From cutting huge amounts of footage to zooming and panning on still photos, the documentarian explains the techniques that distinguish his films—and why changing them now would be “ridiculous.”
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6 min
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As a young director with a risky film, Ken Burns had countless doors slammed in his face. How did he push past them, and how would he advise today’s young […]
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6 min
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The documentarian last took a formal history class in 11th grade, “when they hold a gun to your head.” But as a passionate student of film, he soon became drawn […]
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3 min
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