Ken Burns is basically the king of the "slow zoom" on grainy black-and-white photos. You know the vibe—civil war soldiers, jazz legends, and baseball stars. But with the Ken Burns documentary Leonardo da Vinci, things get weird. In a good way. For the first time in his decades-long career, Burns (along with co-directors Sarah Burns and David McMahon) has stepped outside the boundaries of American history.
It’s a huge gamble.
Think about it. Leonardo died in 1519. There are no photographs. No film reels of him walking through the streets of Florence. No audio recordings of his voice. To tell this story, Burns had to ditch his signature toolkit. Instead of archival footage, we get split-screen montages, modern-day cityscapes, and a heavy focus on the notebooks. Honestly, it’s about time someone treated Leonardo like the frantic, disorganized, beautiful mess he actually was rather than a static statue in a museum.
Breaking the "Americana" Streak
For forty years, Ken Burns has been our national tour guide. He’s the guy who explained the Vietnam War and the Dust Bowl to us. So, why Italy? Why now? The Ken Burns documentary Leonardo da Vinci happened because Leonardo isn't just an artist; he's the ultimate proxy for human curiosity.
Burns has mentioned in interviews that Leonardo’s mind was "interdisciplinary" before that was even a buzzword. The guy was looking at the valves of a heart and then immediately drawing how water flows around a rock in a stream. He saw the connections. This film tries to mirror that chaos. It isn't a linear "he was born, he painted the Mona Lisa, he died" kind of story. It's more of a psychological profile of a man who couldn't stop asking why.
You’ve probably seen documentaries on Leonardo before. Most of them are dry. They feel like a lecture from a guy in a tweed jacket. This one feels different because it uses the "notebooks" as the primary narrator. Leonardo left behind thousands of pages of notes. They are messy. They are backwards (thanks to his mirror-writing). They are full of grocery lists right next to revolutionary designs for flying machines. The film captures that frantic energy.
🔗 Read more: Godfather of Harlem Season 3: Why Bumpy’s Toughest Fight Wasn't on the Streets
The Myth of the Lone Genius
One thing this documentary gets right—and what most people get wrong—is the idea that Leonardo was a lonely hermit. That's a total myth. He was a social butterfly. He loved fine clothes. He had a massive entourage.
The Ken Burns documentary Leonardo da Vinci dives deep into his relationship with his assistants, like Salai, and his complicated dealings with patrons like Ludovico Sforza. Leonardo was a procrastinator. He was notorious for not finishing projects. He spent years on the Adoration of the Magi and then just... stopped. He left the monks who commissioned it hanging for decades.
- He was an outsider.
- Being born out of wedlock meant he couldn't be a lawyer or a doctor like his father.
- This "failure" to fit into society is actually what gave him the freedom to observe the world without the blinders of a formal 15th-century education.
It’s interesting to see Burns tackle the queer history of Leonardo as well. It’s handled with nuance. They don't speculate wildly, but they don't ignore the historical record, specifically the 1476 sodomy charges. It makes him human. It pulls him off the pedestal.
The Visual Language of the Renaissance
Since there’s no footage of the 1400s, the film uses a lot of "cinematographic" tricks. You’ll see split screens where a drawing of a wing is placed next to a high-speed shot of a bird in flight. It’s a bit jarring if you’re used to the slow, somber pace of The Civil War, but it works here. It connects the 15th century to the 21st.
The soundtrack is another departure. Usually, we get fiddle music or period-accurate jazz. Here, the score is often atmospheric and modern. It reinforces the idea that Leonardo’s ideas weren't just "old art"—they were the blueprints for the modern world.
Why the Mona Lisa is the Least Interesting Part
If you go into the Ken Burns documentary Leonardo da Vinci expecting a 4-hour breakdown of why she’s smiling, you might be disappointed. And that’s a good thing. The film treats the Mona Lisa as a lifelong obsession rather than a single event. Leonardo took that painting with him everywhere. He was still working on it in France at the very end of his life.
The real meat of the documentary is his scientific observation. His obsession with water. He called it the "vessel of nature." He spent countless hours watching bubbles, eddies, and waves. He tried to map the movement of water the way a cartographer maps a coastline.
The film also spends a lot of time on The Last Supper. But not just the painting itself—the chemistry. Leonardo was an experimentalist. He tried a new way of painting on dry plaster instead of wet fresco. It was a disaster. The painting started peeling off the wall almost immediately. He knew it was failing, but he did it anyway because he wanted the colors to be more vibrant. He chose beauty over durability. That says more about him than any "da Vinci Code" conspiracy ever could.
📖 Related: Sons of Legion Music: Why This Underground Collective Is Actually Blowing Up
The E-E-A-T Factor: Who is telling this story?
Ken Burns isn't an art historian, and he knows it. To make this work, he brought in the heavy hitters. You’ve got Walter Isaacson, whose biography of Leonardo is basically the gold standard for modern readers. You’ve got art historians like Martin Kemp, who can explain the sfumato technique (that smoky, blurry look in Leonardo’s paintings) in a way that doesn't make your eyes glaze over.
There is a real depth here because the film acknowledges the gaps. We don't know everything. We don't have his "lost" works, like the Battle of Anghiari. We only have copies. The documentary leans into that mystery instead of trying to solve it with fake certainty.
A Different Kind of Documentary
Honestly, some die-hard Ken Burns fans might hate this. It’s loud. It’s visual. It uses sound effects of rushing water and flapping wings that feel very "Hollywood." But that’s exactly what makes it rank among his better works. It’s an evolution.
The film challenges the viewer. It asks you to look at a drawing of a heart valve for three minutes straight while a narrator explains how Leonardo discovered the way blood swirls to close the valve—centuries before medical science caught up. It’s about the "divine proportion." It’s about the Vitruvian Man.
Most importantly, it’s about the fact that Leonardo was a guy who was constantly distracted. He’d start a map, get interested in how a dragonfly moves its wings, and then go off to design a pageant for a Duke. He was the original "multi-hyphenate."
Getting the Most Out of the Film
If you’re going to watch the Ken Burns documentary Leonardo da Vinci, don't binge it. It’s too much information to process in one sitting. It’s better to watch it in chunks. Look at the art. Then go look at his notebooks online.
One of the best resources is the Codex Arundel, which the British Library has digitized. You can flip through the pages while the documentary talks about them. Seeing his actual handwriting—tiny, cramped, and backwards—makes the film’s narrative hit way harder.
Key Insights for the Modern Viewer
Leonardo was a man of the 15th century, but his brain lived in the 22nd. This documentary isn't just a history lesson; it's a call to be more curious.
📖 Related: Nancy Sinatra Photos: What Most People Get Wrong About Her Iconic 1960s Image
- Observe everything. Leonardo’s greatest tool wasn't his brush; it was his eyes. He noticed things other people ignored.
- Embrace the unfinished. Sometimes the process of learning is more valuable than the finished product. Leonardo’s unfinished paintings are more influential than most artists' completed masterpieces.
- Cross the streams. Don't just be a "tech person" or an "art person." Be both. The intersection of different fields is where the magic happens.
This film is a pivot for Burns, but it's a necessary one. It proves that his "American" style can be applied to the universal human experience. Leonardo belongs to the world, and this documentary finally gives him the expansive, messy, and brilliant treatment he deserves.
To really appreciate the depth of what's covered, your next move should be to check out the official PBS companion site. They have interactive versions of the notebooks featured in the film. Seeing the high-resolution scans of his "to-do lists" (which included things like "calculate the measurement of Milan and its suburbs") makes the documentary feel much more personal. Afterward, compare the film's take on The Last Supper with the actual restoration history—it's a rabbit hole that perfectly complements the viewing experience.
Actionable Next Steps:
- Watch the film in two parts. The first half focuses on his rise and his time in Milan; the second half deals with his later years and the obsession with anatomy.
- Explore the Notebooks. Visit the British Library’s digital collection to see the "mirror writing" mentioned in the documentary up close.
- Read Isaacson’s Biography. If the documentary piques your interest, Walter Isaacson’s book Leonardo da Vinci provides the granular detail that even a four-hour film has to skip.
- Look at the "Sfmuato" Technique. Spend five minutes looking at the Virgin of the Rocks and notice the lack of hard lines. This is the core of Leonardo’s visual revolution.