Historical documentaries (1 Viewer)

I'm the same with crime ones.

I like Nazi megastructures.

Evo1883 said:

Absolutely obsessed with them, I must have watched hundreds now, every night for a couple years I choose a subject and usually watch documentaries on said subject until I'm bored.

Most recently watched one on kowloon Walled City.. Fascinating place.

Always love watching ww2 docs and hitlers circle of evil is a good watch on Netflix.

Any suggestions much appreciated

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I enjoy watching about the Mongols and how they conquered half the world. Incredible.

Weird as it may be, I'm actually watching secret Nazi bases now on "yesterday".

Was just flicking through and it looked interesting.

Evo1883 said:

If you get chance, watch any documentary about an island called nazinsky, they call it stalins cannibal Island... Awful

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Making me hungry. What channel was it on?

There are some decent "cult" documentaries too.

I'm guessing you've already seen Ken Burns' Vietnam series, but if anyone else hasn't seen it, it's incredible.

‘WW2 in colour’ On Netflix is really worth a watch

Evo1883 said:

Absolutely obsessed with them, I must have watched hundreds now, every night for a couple years I choose a subject and usually watch documentaries on said subject until I'm bored.

Most recently watched one on kowloon Walled City.. Fascinating place.

Always love watching ww2 docs and hitlers circle of evil is a good watch on Netflix.

Any suggestions much appreciated

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Kowloon as in Hong Kong?

Not documentaries but if you are into historical podcasts Dan Carlin's Hardcore Histories are worth a listen.

A Blueprint for Armageddon is brilliant. All about WW1.

SBT said:

I'm guessing you've already seen Ken Burns' Vietnam series, but if anyone else hasn't seen it, it's incredible.

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I have. Superb. Been meaning to rewatch it. His series about the history of the west of America and the American civil war are also brilliant

fernandopartridge said:

Kowloon as in Hong Kong?

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Our last night of 10 months of backpacking was spent in Kowloon in probably the worst room I have ever stayed in, in my life which was inside the ‘delightful’ Chung King Mansions!!

LastGarrison said:

Our last night of 10 months of backpacking was spent in Kowloon in probably the worst room I have ever stayed in, in my life which was inside the ‘delightful’ Chung King Mansions!!

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I went to HK on honeymoon, was a tiny bit disappointed. Stayed Causeway Bay

Had a brilliant Chinese at one of the night markets though, it was really cheap compared with HK otherwise. I still think about it to this day!

Evo1883 said:

Amazing experience though, albeit shitty at the same time I'd imagine

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Yeah good memories all round.

fernandopartridge said:

I went to HK on honeymoon, was a tiny bit disappointed. Stayed Causeway Bay

Had a brilliant Chinese at one of the night markets though, it was really cheap compared with HK otherwise. I still think about it to this day!

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I only did one night there as we’d ran out of money by then so I’d like to go back and give it another few days.

How come it disappointed?

Anything Ken Burns is worth a look, I really liked his series about Prohibition in particular.

LastGarrison said:

Our last night of 10 months of backpacking was spent in Kowloon in probably the worst room I have ever stayed in, in my life which was inside the ‘delightful’ Chung King Mansions!!

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Haha, I spent a month there in 1992! Character forming experience. 8th floor, tiny, no windows.

We stopped in North Point. Last morning there we had just enough time and cash to get on the peak tram one last time. When it was time to get the tram back down the wife had lost the tickets and the miserable sods wouldn’t let get on without them and we had no spare cash. We ended up walking all the way down Victoria Peak along the old peak road. Serious deep burn in the but cheeks by the time we got to the bottom. Annoying thing was while we waiting at the airport to catch the plane I decided to look through the photos on the camera, pulled it out the case and the tram tickets fell out. Dozy cow.

LastGarrison said:

I only did one night there as we’d ran out of money by then so I’d like to go back and give it another few days.

How come it disappointed?

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I'm not sure, just thought it was a little bit dull. It wasn't bad, I'd give it a second chance.

fernandopartridge said:

I'm not sure, just thought it was a little bit dull. It wasn't bad, I'd give it a second chance.

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Singapore is better. More variety. Little India has a very different vibe to the rest of Singapore. Don’t feel the need to go back to Hong Kong myself, very much feel like I’ve been there done that. I think we were there for three full days IIRC and decided to get the ferry to Macau on the 3 day as we felt we’d seen everything we wanted to see in Hong Kong and Kowloon.

skybluetony176 said:

Singapore is better. More variety. Little India has a very different vibe to the rest of Singapore. Don’t feel the need to go back to Hong Kong myself, very much feel like I’ve been there done that. I think we were there for three full days IIRC and decided to get the ferry to Macau on the 3 day as we felt we’d seen everything we wanted to see in Hong Kong and Kowloon.

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I feel like this thread has been hijacked somewhat but have to agree with you.

Everyone says how boring and totalitarian Singapore is but I really enjoyed it and would definitely go back.

Plus Singapore Zoo is amazing!!

Evo1883 said:

Absolutely obsessed with them, I must have watched hundreds now, every night for a couple years I choose a subject and usually watch documentaries on said subject until I'm bored.

Most recently watched one on kowloon Walled City.. Fascinating place.

Always love watching ww2 docs and hitlers circle of evil is a good watch on Netflix.

Any suggestions much appreciated

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The Netflix doc series on the Vietnam war was very well done.

Just getting back on track with the original post, I absolutely love these sort of documentaries, historical ones mainly, Charles I and Charles II. Victorian stuff, and also in depth stuff on killers - how their minds worked, why they thought they'd get away with stuff, etc. Bloody love documentaries!

The Vietnam War on Netflix is excellent. In 10 parts, and gives a full account of imperial history as well as accounts from both sides of the conflict.

I much prefer actually studying History to watching documentaries. By studying I don't necessarily mean taking a course, but rather reading good books (preferably academic ones) around the subject matters, as they give you a very good grounding into different interpretations of events. Documentaries, I find, tend to be skewed one way or the other.

Walsgrave said:

I much prefer actually studying History to watching documentaries. By studying I don't necessarily mean taking a course, but rather reading good books (preferably academic ones) around the subject matters, as they give you a very good grounding into different interpretations of events. Documentaries, I find, tend to be skewed one way or the other.

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That’s the trick with History isn’t it? Finding different perspectives to get a whole picture.

Never been able to stand it myself. Possibly because my Mum was a Politics & History lecturer and it was all around me growing up. Though that didn’t work for politics so maybe not!

shmmeee said:

That’s the trick with History isn’t it? Finding different perspectives to get a whole picture.

Never been able to stand it myself. Possibly because my Mum was a Politics & History lecturer and it was all around me growing up. Though that didn’t work for politics so maybe not!

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Yes, History along with English Literature are your core, 'rigorous' arts subjects that teach the importance of arguments over the learning of facts. When it gets to Politics, people's emotions take over and whilst this is true for History as well, at least there is an element of time distance between the subject matter and today. We don't, for instance, see too many people outside of the academic sphere debating about the ethics of Henry VII!

City of Life and Death - film about the Sino-Japanese War in Nanking.

I love the WW1/2 stuff, in colour especially. Watched ‘Great British Castles’ on Netflix recently too. Was pretty good. History is a bit like art, big spectrum with so many flavours.

it’s probably why I drive trucks for a living. At school if it wasn’t history or PE, I didn’t give a shit. Teachers used to say I wouldn’t get anywhere in life by just looking out of the window all the time. That’s pretty much what I get paid to do now!