Product Description

From awe-inspiring buildings and life-changing technological innovations to the most terrible engineering disasters of our time, MODERN MARVELS goes behind the scenes of the world s most spectacular creations and its biggest failures. In this 14-disc set, the acclaimed series examines history from every conceivable angle, from the designers behind the world s architectural masterpieces and the biggest engineering failures to greatest inventions and the worst disasters. MODERN MARVELS profiles these amazing historic turning points through interviews with the builders and dreamers who created high-tech devices and man-made wonders and exclusive archive footage to analyze what has gone wrong and what s held up over the ages. This gripping collection takes an incisive look at the catastrophic failures that stunned the world--from the Union Carbide explosion to Hurricane Katrina. These programs also pay homage to the pinnacles of human achievement, from the Chrysler Building to the Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge. Celebrating ingenuity on a grand scale and accepting failures as stepping stones to a brighter future, MODERN MARVELS offers an exciting look at invention and imagination brought to life.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #15978 in DVD
• Brand: A&E
• Released on: 2008-05-27
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Box set, Black & White, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 14
• Running time: 2115 minutes

Customer Reviews

Lots of death and destruction
This is about 35 hours of documentaries from the History Channel's "Modern Marvels" series. Most of the disks have four 45-minute episodes made up of about a half dozen disasters per episode.

The first 4 or 5 disks are mostly death-and-destruction. The disasters range from drilling into a salt dome under a lake (oops!), 600 people dying in fire at the over-crowded Cocoanut Grove nightclub, airplane crashes, bridge collapses, building collapses, dam collapses, mine fires, tanker and paddlewheeler explosions, tower collapses, and...well, you get the idea.

Many of the disasters were a culmination of a series of little errors here and there that finally added up to the big problem, while some were (as one person explains) a "failure of Construction 101" in the case of a parking structure collapse.

Other episodes are more benign "Modern Marvels", such as rubber, distilleries, candy, monumental buildings and bridges, and high-tech sex, and toilet tech :-)

The minor negatives include the narrator's delivery which uses too many dramatic pauses so that you don't really...know when he has finished...speaking. Also, there is no episode guide booklet, and the individual DVD cases are a little vague as to the exact contents.

I bought this when it was on one of Amazon's recent great sales, and it worked out to less than three bucks per disk. At the regular going price, it is probably still a good value.

Great Modern Marvels
If you enjoy Modern Marvels: Technical and How-They-Do-It documentaries;
this is great. Several disaster episodes and one with a sex-theme which should have been replaced with something more consistent. However, if you get a good price for this huge collection, it won't matter.

fantastic
My husband and sons thoroughly enjoyed this selection of marvel dvds. In a word I would say awesome!!