TV Series: Band of Brothers - HBO Mini-Series

One of the greatest war TV shows ever made debuted on HBO on September 9, 2001, only a few days before the tragic events of September 11.

When I finally watched the complete series a few years ago, I was overwhelmed with the bravery and stories of these great soldiers. It is truly an epic masterpiece!

Many of the actors in the film have gone on to have successful careers in both film and TV. It is a great series that everyone should see.

A great article I came across about them was posted recently:

'Band of Brothers' actors are a successful, tight unit - Ten years ago, 'Band of Brothers' aired starring largely unknown performers. Since then, their careers have blossomed and they gather annually for a reunion. Read More: http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/tv/la-et-band-of-brothers-20110908,0,1628152.story

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Band of Brothers is a 2001 ten-part, 11-hour television World War II miniseries based on the book of the same title written by historian and biographer Stephen E. Ambrose. The executive producers were Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks, who had collaborated on the World War II film Saving Private Ryan (1998). The episodes first aired in 2001 on HBO and are still run frequently on various TV networks around the world.

The narrative centers on the experiences of E Company ("Easy Company") of the 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment assigned to the 101st Airborne Division of the United States Army. The series covers Easy's basic training at Camp Toccoa, Georgia, the American airborne landings in Normandy, Operation Market Garden, the Siege of Bastogne and on to the end of the war, including the taking of the Kehlsteinhaus (Hitler's Eagle's Nest).

The events portrayed are based on Ambrose's research and recorded interviews with Easy Company veterans. A large amount of literary license was taken with the episodes, with several differences between recorded history and the film version. All of the characters portrayed are based on actual members of Easy Company; some of them can be seen in prerecorded interviews as a prelude to each episode (their identities, however, are not revealed until the close of the finale).

The title for the book and the series comes from a famous St. Crispin's Day Speech delivered by the character of Henry V of England before the Battle of Agincourt in William Shakespeare's Henry V; Act IV, Scene 3. A passage from the speech is quoted on the first page of the book, and is also quoted by Carwood Lipton in the final episode.

Read More: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Band_of_Brothers_(TV_miniseries)

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VIDEO: Band of Brothers - Official Trailer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ehwsOL04og

VIDEO: Band of Brothers - The Inspiring Opening Theme Song To The Series By  Michael Kamen - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LotPYoDtxaU

Profile: Richard Wright - Author

Richard Nathaniel Wright (September 4, 1908 – November 28, 1960) was an African-American author of sometimes controversial novels, short stories and non-fiction. Much of his literature concerns racial themes, especially those involving the plight of African-Americans during the 19th century. His work helped redefine discussions of race relations in America in the mid-20th century.

Wright gained national attention for the collection of four short stories titled Uncle Tom's Children (1938). He based some stories on lynching in the Deep South. By May 6, 1938 excellent sales had provided him with enough money to move to Harlem, where he began writing Native Son (1940).

The collection also earned him a Guggenheim Fellowship, which allowed him to complete Native Son. It was selected by the Book of the Month Club as its first book by an African-American author. The lead character, Bigger Thomas, represented the limitations that society placed on African Americans as he could only gain his own agency and self-knowledge by committing heinous acts.

Wright was criticized for his works' concentration on violence. In the case of Native Son, people complained that he portrayed a black man in ways that seemed to confirm whites' worst fears. The period following publication of Native Son was a busy time for Wright. In July 1940 he went to Chicago to do research for a folk history of blacks to accompany photographs selected by Edwin Rosskam. While in Chicago he visited the American Negro Exhibition with Langston Hughes, Arna Bontemps and Claude McKay.

Read More: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Wright_(author)

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"My mother's suffering grew into a symbol in my mind, gathering to itself all the poverty, the ignorance, the helplessness; the painful, baffling, hunger-ridden days and hours; the restless moving, the futile seeking, the uncertainty, the fear, the dread; the meaningless pain and the endless suffering. Her life set the emotional tone of my life, colored the men and women I was to meet in the future, conditioned my relation to events that had not yet happened, determined my attitude to situations and circumstances I had yet to face. A somberness of spirit that I was never to lose settled over me during the slow years of my mother's unrelieved suffering, a somberness that was to make me stand apart and look upon excessive joy with suspicion, that was to make me keep forever on the move, as though to escape a nameless fate seeking to overtake me.

At the age of twelve, before I had one year of formal schooling, I had a conception of life that no experience would ever erase, a predilection for what was real that no argument could ever gainsay, a sense of the world that was mine and mine alone, a notion as to what life meant that no education could ever alter, a conviction that the meaning of living came only when one was struggling to wring a meaning out of meaningless suffering.


At the age of twelve I had an attitude toward life that was to endure, that was to make me seek those areas of living that would keep it alive, that was to make me skeptical of everything while seeking everything, tolerant of all and yet critical. The spirit I had caught gave me insight into the sufferings of others, made me gravitate toward those whose feelings were like my own, made me sit for hours while others told me of their lives, made me strangely tender and cruel, violent and peaceful.


It made me want to drive coldly to the heart of every question and it open to the core of suffering I knew I would find there. It made me love burrowing into psychology, into realistic and naturalistic fiction and art, into those whirlpools of politics that had the power to claim the whole of men's souls. It directed my loyalties to the side of men in rebellion; it made me love talk that sought answers to questions that could help nobody, that could only keep alive in me that enthralling sense of wonder and awe in the face of the drama of human feeling which is hidden by the external drama of life."

 — Richard Wright (Black Boy)


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August 31 1997 - The Death of Diana, Princess of Wales

On August 31, 1997, Diana, Princess of Wales, died as a result of injuries sustained in a car accident in the Pont de l'Alma road tunnel in Paris, France. Her companion, Dodi Fayed, and the driver of the Mercedes-Benz W140, Henri Paul, were pronounced dead at the scene of the accident. Fayed's bodyguard, Trevor Rees-Jones, was the only survivor. Although at first the media pinned the blame on the paparazzi, the crash was ultimately found to be caused by the reckless actions of the chauffeur, who was the head of security at the Ritz and had earlier goaded the paparazzi waiting outside the hotel. An 18-month French judicial investigation concluded in 1999 that the crash was caused by Henri Paul, who lost control of the car at high speed while drunk. His inebriation may have been made worse by the simultaneous presence of an anti-depressant and traces of a tranqulizing anti-psychotic in his body.

From February 1998, Dodi's father, Mohamed Al-Fayed (the owner of the Hôtel Ritz, for which Paul worked) claimed that the crash was a result of a conspiracy, and later contended that the crash was orchestrated by MI6 on the instructions of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. His claims that the crash was a result of a conspiracy were dismissed by a French judicial investigation and by Operation Paget, a Metropolitan police inquiry that concluded in 2006.

An inquest headed by Lord Justice Scott Baker into the deaths of Diana and Dodi began at the Royal Courts of Justice, London, on 2 October 2007 and was a continuation of the original inquest that began in 2004. On 7 April 2008, the jury released an official statement that Diana and Dodi were unlawfully killed by the grossly negligent driving of chauffeur Henri Paul and the paparazzi. Though the official verdict implicated the pursuing vehicles, the jury also named the intoxication of the driver and the victims' decisions to not wear seat-belts as contributing factors to their deaths. Additionally, the Mercedes had been travelling at over twice the legal speed limit of that particular section of road and had long since left the paparazzi vehicles far behind by the time the accident occurred.

READ MORE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Diana,_Princess_of_Wales

VIDEO: BBC Announce The Princess of Wales has died.

VIDEO: Princess Diana - BBC Announce her death and tribute

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Poem: If You Only Knew

IF YOU ONLY KNEW

A darkened room
Is this place I call home.

Down the corridor
Of your world
Is a place
Dimly lit.

Please, patiently see
Inside my soul.

Every direction points
Back to the heart of this.

Within the roaring
of passion, an unfortunate child inside
Is waiting.

You don’t know how I feel
Being this way;
Wide-eyed and naïve.

Starving for attention.

Give ear, give sight
At these feelings that long for you.

Tied to the Kissing Tree
Is where we should go.

And I will love you
Every moment
In that garden called Beautiful.

Because you are the rose
In mid-summer,
The star twinkling at my wishes.

I have often wondered
If you would ever cross the line
Between simplicity and madness
For the sake
Of being my love,
Faithfully yours.

For the time
Will one day come
When you’ll be ready
To fly with me
In the glow
Of the sun.

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©1998 All Rights Reserved.

To view and order The Kiss of Life – Go to:

http://torrenceking.blogspot.com/2011/08/kiss-of-life-poetry-art-collection.html


 

Profile Playlist: Aaliyah (1979-2001)

Aaliyah Dana Haughton (January 16, 1979 – August 25, 2001), who performed under the mononym Aaliyah ( /əˈliːə/), was an American R&B recording artist, actress and model. She was born in Brooklyn, New York, and was raised in Detroit, Michigan. At the age of 10, she appeared on the television show Star Search and performed in concert alongside Gladys Knight. At age 12, Aaliyah signed with Jive Records and her uncle Barry Hankerson's Blackground Records. Hankerson introduced her to R. Kelly, who became her mentor, as well as lead songwriter and producer of her debut album, Age Ain't Nothing but a Number. The album sold three million copies in the United States and was certified double platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). After facing allegations of an illegal marriage with R.Kelly, Aaliyah ended her contract with Jive and signed with Atlantic Records.

Aaliyah worked with record producers Timbaland and Missy Elliott for her second album, One in a Million; it sold 3.7 million copies in the United States and over eight million copies worldwide. In 2000, Aaliyah appeared in her first major film, Romeo Must Die. She contributed to the film's soundtrack, which spawned the single "Try Again". The song topped the Billboard Hot 100 solely on airplay, making Aaliyah the first artist in Billboard history to achieve this feat. "Try Again" earned Aaliyah a Grammy Award nomination for Best Female R&B Vocalist.

READ MORE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaliyah

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Are You That Somebody - Aaliyah Ft. Timbaland -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2cFYFuAX4N4

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Don’t Know What To Tell Ya

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=901FA0_A5uU

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Try Again

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aRcAvsZgjXA

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Come Over

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0dbD9whBXY

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At Your Best (You Are Love)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5i0XGs39BrQ

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