Customer Reviews

Egypt: Rediscovering a Lost World

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you are looking around for a DVD about Ancient Egypt I would recommend this one over all others. I have not seen all the DVDs covering Ancient Egypt but I have seen several and this one is at an entirely higher level. This DVD covers the stories of three of the most exciting life adventures really of all time; Howard Carter, discoverer of Tutankhamun's tomb, Giovanni Belzoni, discoverer of the hidden entrance to Ramesses temple at Abu Simbel and Pharaoh Seti I's tomb and Jean-Francois Champollion who solved the Ancient Egyptian language of the hieroglyphs that had been lost for almost two thousand years. These are extraordinary adventures, life consuming and life changing - and history changing as well as Champollion learned to read the hieroglyphs. This is the best DVD I have seen covering ancient Egypt, the best telling of Howard Carter's discovery of Tutankamun's tomb and the only stories I have seen telling the extraordinary discoveries of Giovanni Belzoni and Jean-Francois Champollion who is considered the founding father of Egyptology. During the telling of Giovanni Belzoni's story there is also a lot of flash back to the time of Ramesses as many of Belzoni's discoveries related to Ramesses. This is an extraordinary DVD with over six hours of fact based adventures and really value priced for what you get. Special feature included on the Nile River with total run time listed at 360 minutes. Highest rating.

I have not seen this yet. It gets excellent reviews on Amazon.co.uk.

I will be buying it from Amazon.co.uk. The U.K. version is described there as lasting 360 minutes. The U.S. version is described here as lasting 300 minutes.

American studios do this kind of thing to DVDs quite often. See, e.g., "Vietnam, A Television History," in which two out of the thirteen original PBS episodes were quietly excluded from the DVD, and other episodes were edited down from the originals. The studios often fill up the saved time on the DVDs with advertisements. It tells us a lot about what the studios think about their U.S. viewers.

As you probably know, you will need a mutli-region DVD player to watch a DVD purchased from the U.K.

This is a truly great DVD set.

"Don't know much about history", as the song goes, but a friend back in the UK said this was a cool way to find out more about the Egyptian variety. I've just finished watching and I've got to say that they're right. This is entertaining, involving and I learned a whole lot about a fascinating period. I never knew that Egypt was pretty well forgotten and unvisited by Europeans for hundreds of years. I never knew that even the Egyptians didn't know how to read hieroglyphs when the last priests of Ancient Egypt died and it took a Frenchman to show them how. I never knew that in the early 1800s the Egyptians themselves were dismantling the ancient monuments and using the stones for factories. The visiting Europeans (like Napoleon) were as bad - with a very thin line between preservation and outright theft. Most of the stuff in today's great Egyptian collections in Italy, Paris and the British Museum in London (including the famous Rosetta Stone) was plundered.

And it's not just the history that's so good - this is a well written, well acted and beautifully directed mixture of facts and drama. If you want to know more about Egypt and find out about three of the characters who helped rediscover the ancient civilisation and bring it back to life I can highly recommend this DVD set.

Can't really beat the Amazon summary of this set but I'd add that you don't need to like history or even Ancient Egyptian history to get something from this series. Basically, this is three stories about three guys who fought against the odds and, whether they knew it or not, literally changed history. My favourite is Jean-Francois Champollion, a downtrodden young Frenchman from a poor family who got involved in a race with a rich Englishman to be the first to translate hieroglyphs. I ended up really rooting for J-F, so much so that I've just ordered a biography of him. I liked the stuff too on how being able to read hieroglyphs for the first time revealed secrets about the pyramids.

I was really surprised how much I liked this and it's made me want to find out more. A total 5 out of 5 stars for this one.

This 2 disc DVD set has got to be my most favorite! I have always loved Egypt, and the grandeur of the tombs, as well as the spectacular architecture of the Pyramids, and temples. These DVD's bring information about the Acheologists, and their attention to detail with regards to the ruins that were found. The detailed pictures, and notations of the heiroglyphs, the logging of all artifacts found in Tuts tomb, and the hardships made in deciphering the Rosetta Stone... Wonderful information, but most of all, I could feel the excitement that these men had, seeing for the first time the beauty that is EGYPT! My heart fluttered many times while watching Chapolione read the heiroglyphs, and his pursuit to bring the words of the temples, and tombs to the world! Inspiring... and breath taking filming. A "must" have to everyones Egypt collection.

This documentary is different as the content is presented as actual events. Although the stories have to be abbreviated (through necessity) the result is first rate.

I watched this DVD while flying to Egypt for a tour. It was both informative and entertaining- certainly the best of several DVD's that I watched. It is limited to Howard Carter, Belzoni and Champollion. A "must watch" if you are going to Egypt.

Do you know who deciphered the Rosetta stone? Do you know who found "King Tut?" ...Do you care?

History documentaries bring up painful memories of monotone narrators and cheesy extras playing historical figures. On the face of it, you might not care at all about anything related to Egypt save something about the pyramids.

Which is why it is a good thing that this is no ordinary documentary...er tv mini-series...err historical drama...This "program" really seems to just elude definition.

Perhaps you might find the pyramids to be pinnacle of your ancient Egypt knowledge and interest. After watching it once, and then again, and maybe just a few more times, you might find yourself a bit more knowledgeable about Egypt related history. And to think that this happened while you were being entertained!?

Now perhaps there are some subtle details that miiiight be fictionalized such as Carter's potential love interest and Belzoni maybe not being as strong as you thought, but it actually adds some charm (just as long as you don't make a thesis about Champollion's ripped pants).

The best part about this program is its true money value. You are getting what you paid for because you will want to watch it repeatedly. Though you might end up spending all that saved money on the following products:
The Discovery of the Tomb of Tutankhamen
Travels in Egypt and Nubia (The Great Adventures)
The Code-breaker's Secret Diaries: Rediscovering Ancient Egypt

I can't really put it any better than the editorial review about this film found here on Amazon. I've really been on something of a "documentary kick" lately and this particular one from the BBC is one of the most enjoyable I've seen yet. Besides the usual bits about Howard Carter finding Kig Tut's magnificent tomb, which actually were more informative than I expected, I learned about "The Great Belzoni" and the significant contributions of Jean-François Champollion in solving the hieroglyphics mystery. I'd heard briefly of Champollion before, though I'd forgotten everything about him other than that he was French, but I never heard anything about Belzoni who appears from the documentary to have been quite a character. I'm pleased to see that Belzoni left us a couple of books about his exploits, which can be found at Archive.org. These books should be enjoyable and are definitely going onto my reading list. As for the BBC documentary, I really liked it and highly recommend it!

This 2 disc set is the best series I have ever seen. I felt I was there - totally enthralling.