Customer Reviews

National Geographic: Icons of Power - Empress of Ambition, Catherine the Great

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Very interesting history about court intrigue surrounding problematic succession to the throne in eighteenth-century Russia and interesting coverage of the 1743-44 revolution led by the Cossack, Emilyan Pugachev. Alas the production was marred by the irritating repetitive use (sometimes as often as four or five times) of brief video clips, sudden unexpected rapidly telescoping shots, and distractingly angled still shots.

It felt as if seven or eight brief film clips were playing in continuous loops, and every now and then the movie would momentarily jump to one of those loops. My wife was so irritated by these recurring clips that she gave up on the film about half way through.

National Geographic uses a lot of filming techniques that Vince McMahon planned to employ in his XFL. I think this is meant to get fickle viewers into caring about history. The company's historical reenactments aren't as cheesy as History Channel's. Perhaps this is caused by NG using film while HC uses video. The actress playing young Catherine looks like Ashley Judd. Sometimes I stop watching fictional films about 2/3 into them because I get the gist of what's being portrayed. Here, I had to watch the whole thing because I was genuinely curious why Catherine is remembered in history as "Great." The drama surrounding her rise to power was very similar to Cleopatra's. The documentary sometimes uses the term "class warfare." Though Lenin's success 150 years after Catherine is not mentioned, one could see how the class schisms in Russia, even then, would fuel the Communist rise in the 1910s. This program is too long to be seen in an American public school's history class. Besides, little focus is given to Russia in American schools until discussions of the Cold War. Still, if you have an interest in historical women of power, then you should see this.

I have been a fan of Russian history even before Ivan the terrible. He was a case. While serftom was wrong. At the top of the sceme was life ever good. It amaze's me that with Peter the Great and Elizabeth then Catherine the Great. Scemeing and politics was something else. She truly carried Russia to its top.