''Cold War'' is a twenty-four episode

television documentary Television documentaries are televised media productions that screen documentaries. Television documentaries exist either as a television documentary series or as a television documentary film. * Television documentary series, sometimes called d ...

series about the

Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...

that first aired in 1998."Episode 1: Comrades, 1917-1945".
'' CNN: Cold War''. Archived fro
the original
on December 10, 2008. It features interviews and footage of the events that shaped the tense relationships between the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

and the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. The series was produced by Pat Mitchell and

Jeremy Isaacs Sir Jeremy Israel Isaacs (born 28 September 1932) is a Scottish television producer and executive, and an opera manager. Following a career at Granada Television, the BBC and Thames Television, Isaacs was the founding chief executive of Channe ...

, who had earlier in 1973 produced the World War II documentary series ''

The World at War ''The World at War'' is a 26-episode British documentary television series that chronicles the events of the Second World War. Produced in 1973 at a cost of around £880,000 (), it was the most expensive factual series ever made at the time. ...

'' in a similar style.

Ted Turner Robert Edward Turner III (born November 19, 1938) is an American entrepreneur, television producer, media proprietor, and Philanthropy, philanthropist. He founded the CNN, Cable News Network (CNN), the first 24-hour United States cable news, ...

funded the series as a joint production between the

Turner Broadcasting System Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. was an American television and media conglomerate founded by Ted Turner in 1965. Based in Atlanta, Georgia, it merged with Time Warner (later WarnerMedia) on October 10, 1996. As of April 2022, all of its asse ...

and the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

. It was first broadcast on

CNN Cable News Network (CNN) is a multinational news organization operating, most notably, a website and a TV channel headquartered in Atlanta. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable ne ...

in the

between September 27, 1998, and April 4, 1999, and

BBC Two BBC Two is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's second flagship channel, and it covers a wide range of subject matte ...

in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

. Writers included Hella Pick,

Lawrence Freedman Sir Lawrence David Freedman, (born 1948) is a British academic, historian and author specialising in foreign policy, international relations and strategy. He has been described as the "dean of British strategic studies" and was a member of th ...

Neal Ascherson Charles Neal Ascherson (born 5 October 1932) is a Scottish journalist and writer. In his youth he fought for the British in the Malayan Emergency. He has been described by Radio Prague as "one of Britain's leading experts on central and easte ...

Hugh O'Shaughnessy Hugh O'Shaughnessy (21 January 1935 – 1 March 2022) was an English journalist and writer. Biography O'Shaughnessy was born in Reading, Berkshire of Irish parents. His father, Charles, was a porter at the Home Office, and his mother, Mary (nee ...

and

Germaine Greer Germaine Greer (; born 29 January 1939) is an Australian writer and feminist, regarded as one of the major voices of the second-wave feminism movement in the latter half of the 20th century. Specializing in English and women's literature, she ...

Kenneth Branagh Sir Kenneth Charles Branagh ( ; born 10 December 1960) is a British actor and filmmaker. Born in Belfast and raised primarily in Reading, Berkshire, Branagh trained at RADA in London and served as its president from 2015 to 2024. List of award ...

was the narrator, and

Carl Davis Carl Davis (October 28, 1936 – August 3, 2023) was an American-born British conductor and composer. He wrote music for more than 100 television programmes, notably the landmark ITV series '' The World at War'' (1973) and BBC's '' Pride and P ...

(who also collaborated with Isaacs with ''The World at War'') composed the theme music. Each episode would feature historical footage and interviews from both significant figures and others who had witnessed particular events. After the series was broadcast it was released as a set of twelve (NTSC) or eight (PAL)

VHS VHS (Video Home System) is a discontinued standard for consumer-level analog video recording on tape cassettes, introduced in 1976 by JVC. It was the dominant home video format throughout the tape media period of the 1980s and 1990s. Ma ...

cassettes. The series was released on DVD by Warner Home Video on May 8, 2012, in

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri ...

. The archival footage has been cropped for widescreen presentation instead of being left in the original format "DVD Review: Cold War - The Complete Series".
''moviefreak.com'', May 15, 2012. Archived fro
the original

Episodes

Each episode lasts approximately 46 minutes.

VHS vs DVD editions

The VHS version is formatted with 4:3 aspect ratio, common for CRT television sets. The interviews are cropped on the sides to fit television screen. The DVD version is formatted with 16:9 aspect ratio, suitable for widescreen television sets. The archival film is cropped on top and bottom to achieve wider aspect ratio. File:Cnn_cold_war_reel_comparison.jpg, Archival film example, VHS (left) vs. DVD (right) File:CNN_Cold_War_interview_comparison.jpg, Interview example, VHS (left) vs. DVD (right)

References

External links

CNN official website for the series
(2014 version)
CNN official website for the series
(original 1998 version, archived by the

Wayback Machine The Wayback Machine is a digital archive of the World Wide Web founded by Internet Archive, an American nonprofit organization based in San Francisco, California. Launched for public access in 2001, the service allows users to go "back in ...

)
''The Cold War over CNN's ''Cold War

Richard Pipes Richard Edgar Pipes (; July 11, 1923 – May 17, 2018) was an American historian who specialized in Russian and Soviet history. Pipes was a frequent interviewee in the press on the matters of Soviet history and foreign affairs. His writings als ...

Robert Conquest George Robert Acworth Conquest (15 July 19173 August 2015) was a British and American historian, poet, novelist, and propagandist. He was briefly a member of the Communist Party of Great Britain but later wrote several books condemning commun ...

and John Lewis Gaddis debate the accuracy of the series in this Hoover Institute publication. *
All episodes
at the

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...

Extended interviews
at the

National Security Archive The National Security Archive is a 501(c)(3) non-governmental, non-profit research and archival institution located on the campus of the George Washington University in Washington, D.C. Founded in 1985 to check rising government secrecy, the N ...

. {{TCA Award for Outstanding Achievement in News and Information American documentary television series American military television series 1990s American documentary television series 1998 American television series debuts 1998 British television series debuts 1998 American television series endings 1998 British television series endings 1990s British documentary television series Documentary films about the Cold War Documentary television series about economics Documentary television series about the Cold War American English-language television shows

Episodes

VHS vs DVD editions

Further reading

References

External links