"The Gene: An Intimate History"

[JMCx4]

I watched segments of this new 2-part 4-hour Ken Burns produced documentary on my local PBS station last night, and I intended to sit down this weekend and watch it beginning to end on the PBS webpage (which also has the usual plethora of supporting & descriptive content). The film is based on a 2016 book of the same name written by Dr. Siddhartha Mukherjee; Dr. Sid is featured throughout the TV mini-series with cameo pieces tying together various story lines. Typical high quality & thought provoking content of a Ken Burns film, with fascinating stories about genetic research over human history and many emotional glimpses into the lives of modern researchers and patients & their families (all three groups sometimes overlapping). The film makers also give what seemed to be fair time to the embedded topic of ethics in human genomics, while keeping the main focus on discoveries so far & hopes for future advances in the science. I can recommend "The Gene" on just the hour or so that I've watched so far, and I expect to learn & enjoy more in the next couple of days.

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[StrangeVision]

The book was really good, not as good as his first book (which was also adapted into a Ken Burns film), but both are terrific. I recorded part 2 of this series and I think part 1 is available on demand, so I'll get around to watching it at some point.

 

[JMCx4]

I realized today that PBS is also broadcasting a 2017 documentary film called "The Gene Doctors" that has a similar tone & subject matter. Got me confused, but both this & the Burns film have very good content IMO.

 

[JMCx4]

Watched Part 1 of the subject documentary this evening. Compelling story lines as I'd hoped. Surprisingly a bit rough in some of the voice-over splices, which became distracting in spots; I expected better from a Burns film.

 

[LadyStanley]

Watched both parts. Another Ken Burns win. Both sides of the ethics arguments are there, along with the eugenics movement from pre-Nazi WWII to now.

Really sad to see the unintended death of a young man from virus delivery.

 

[JMCx4]

@LadyStanley : You need to consider using a Spoiler Alert next time. I finished Part 2 after your post just above. Luckily, it didn't spoil the rest of the story for me.

I don't think the documentary was a "Ken Burns win" of the magnitude of some of his other productions (e.g., The Civil War, The Roosevelts, Baseball, The National Parks), but I do think it presented the topic of genetics and its scientific & ethical & personal aspects in a way that should make it easier to understand for the general public. And in that, the film makes a very important contribution to the human conversation.