Frank Martin’s, For Love of Liberty: The Story of America’s Black Patriots, tells of the sacrifices and courage of African-Americans in service to their country. In many cases these stories have gone untold.

The documentary is hosted by Halle Berry, introduced by Colin Powell, narrated by Avery Brooks and executive produced by Louis Gossett Jr. The U.S. Army was integral I in making the film.

The film is a nominee for an NAACP Image Award. The film starts at the beginning of American History with the death of Crispus Attucks. If you do not know who Attucks was, and you are an American, shame on you.

Check local listings in February. For more information head to www.forloveofliberty.org

Back in 1984 David Travis was capturing Los Angeles punk rock on video. He took hundreds of hours of L.A. shows and did tons of interviews. In this video A History Lesson Part 1, footage from 1984 is presented and it includes the likes of Meat Puppets, Minutemen, Twisted Roots and Redd Kross. Interviews with each group are also included.

Travis is an L.A. native whose dad worked in television. When he was 15 Dad gave him an old video camera. He documented punk rock in L.A. until 1997 (he also worked on videos for bands and other projects). Travis became a teacher for a decade and then began digitizing his old footage. This is the first video from the archive.

A six DVD collection of the work of the fabulous Ernie Kovacs comes out on April 19. It is sort of sad that more people don’t know about Ernie Kovacs. His television show wason for 4 years (the show that "took" anyway..there were other short duration shows!) but its impact was extensive. Kovacs tragically died in 1962 in a car accident. He also contributed to numerous other programs including The Tonight Show. He was offbeat in the extreme and so far ahead of his time it is almost hard to imagine some of the skits got on television. He influenced the likes of Johnny Carson and Pee Wee Herman but a lot of it always reminded me of Monty Python as well, or even SCTV. I have no proof other than my own sense of humor, however, for this last one!

The six DVDs come via Shout Factory and if you order from them direct there is a seventh disc. This includes thirteen hours of Television content, much of which hasn’t been seen for decades (including guest hosting of The Tonight Show).

Kovacs was survived by his wife (and co-star), Edie Adams. Adams appeared in such films as The Apartment, Lover Come Back, It's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World and even Up In Smoke. Adams passed away at the age of 81 in 2008. Without her Kovacs' work might have vanished.

This is the first comprehensive box set ever on Kovacs and you can get it for $69.97 ($54.99 if you get it direct). I am getting one and if you love comedy, great skit comedy particularly, this is a must have. I would compare him to some of the great comedians of all time.

Order from Shout Factory HERE.