Unforgettable: 100 Years Remembered

Marketed as a look back at the twentieth century, Unforgettable's focus is actually on how several dozen senior citizens felt about the events of the past century, particularly the first half. Its interviewees are not all centenarians, as the promo material suggested, nor are they all consistently identified. Divided into seven short segments on war, work, the stock market crash, love, innovation, change, and wisdom, the program features Canadians from ages 74 to 102 offering charming, personal reminiscences on what they got paid for their first jobs, how they felt when World War I started, and why they think they've managed to live so long. While these memories and words of wisdom are appealingly and engagingly presented (and accompanied by lots of what surely must have been very expensively procured archival footage), the program is just neither informative enough to bolster a homework assignment, nor in-depth enough to gratify the casual video-sleeve flipper. A better and much more comprehensive survey of eyewitness reports can be found in The People's Century (VL-5/99). Aud: J, H, P. (K. Glaser)