Archive for October, 2008

FRONTLINE takes viewers to the deadliest front in Afghanistan and across the border to the insurgent safe havens deep inside Pakistan’s tribal areas. This is where the next battles will be fought – and may be lost.

“… Rigorously reported and somberly produced, “The War Briefing” is both a diagrammatic explanation of everything that has gone wrong [in Afghanistan] over the past few years and a grim visual tour of a landscape that nature itself seems to have made impervious to the ambitions of outside occupiers. Factually the film reprises recent news reports … but at the same time it palpably delivers a sense of our narrowing options…”
– Ginia Bellafante, The New York Times

“… Has anyone done better long-form TV journalism during this election cycle than PBS’ Frontline? … “The War Briefing” looks at the complicated and troubled military legacy left behind by Bush and Cheney that the new president will have to deal with as soon as he takes office …
– David Zurawik, The Baltimore Sun

“… “Briefing” brings together journalists, diplomats and others, along with film from a cameraman embedded with U.S. Army troops in the Korengal River Valley, a major Taliban smuggling route. The result is persuasive and scary.”
– Tony Perry, Los Angeles Times

“Frontline is consistently one of the most watchable and informative newsmagazines, thanks to its literal documentary style and its reluctance to stage phoney dramatized re-creations. … The result is a tough, hard-hitting, frequently compelling program that’s well worth an hour of your time.”
– Alex Strachan, Canwest News Service

“… a sobering look at the foreign policy challenges for the next president …”
– Kevin McDonough, United Features Syndicate

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FRONTLINE reports from inside America’s largest companies on how the risk of climate change legislation is rattling big business and on their struggle for survival.

“It’s too bad weasely answers can’t somehow be converted into clean energy, because Martin Smith, the “Frontline” producer and reporter, elicits a lot of them in “Heat,” his savvy investigation of global warming and our chances of stopping it…”
– Neil Genzlinger, The New York Times

“… Thorough and wide-ranging, “Heat” takes us from India’s cement factories … and the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Bali to the international empire that is Exxon and the chambers of the Congress. …

“It’s enough to make a person turn off all the lights, pull the covers over her head and weep. But that, of course, is the problem. This is exactly what Americans have done for far too long. Or at least this is what “Heat” argues, and it does so quite persuasively…”
– Mary McNamara, Los Angeles Times

“Nobody watches “Frontline” for the comedy, but I found it amusing to see publicists squirm under vigilant grilling. … Students of evasion, double talk and nondenial denials should not miss this.”
– Kevin McDonough, United Features Syndicate

… [P]eerless Martin Smith looks into the main issues of global pollution, the ambivalent role of the U.S. industry and the prospects of environmental change given a new administration. Its typically clear delineations of the issues, it turns out, makes it a perfect choice for pre-election consideration.
– Roger Catlin, Hartford Courant

“”Heat” won’t stop money from talking. Chances are, nothing will. But understanding the complex issues behind all those talking points might at least move more of us to demand a say in the future that seems to be coming, whether we’re ready or not.”
– Ellen Gray, Philadelphia Daily News

“When it comes to climate change, the official word on the campaign trail is optimism. … “Heat,” the “Frontline” documentary that premieres tonight, … functions as a big wet blanket, a sad reminder that, in this country and many others, the sort of change the planet needs has never come easily. This is an in-depth look at the impediments to climate change solutions, with a focus on the political system that has, so far, resisted anything more than tiny, piecemeal efforts…”
– Joanna Weiss, The Boston Globe

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