NEW ORLEANS – Ace documentarian Ken Burns remembers the two facts that compelled him to make his upcoming PBS epic, “The War.”

One was a poll that showed 40 percent of high school seniors believe America and Germany fought as allies against Russia in World War II.

The other is that 1,000 World War II veterans die each day.

More than 14 hours in length spread over seven installments, the maxiseries – which tracks World War II through the eyes of residents of four American towns – isn’t scheduled to air until September 2007. But in New Orleans last week for the International Conference on World War II, Burns, accompanied by co-producer Lynn Novick, screened about an hour of clips from the upcoming film to conference participants and one television critic.

Burns’ long-form takes on “Baseball” and “Jazz” for PBS had their detractors, but his 1990 masterpiece “The Civil War” was as good as TV may ever get.

With a score by Wynton Marsalis, “The War” will have been in production more than seven years by the time it airs.

And while it’s too early to assess the full work, the clips received a standing ovation from the crowd, which actually cheered the news that the documentary runs to 14 hours.

My capsule critique is that the documentary has maps with moving arrows on them. This usually signifies greatness: Think “Casablanca” to “Raiders of the Lost Ark” to “Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan.”

Unlike most of his earlier films, this one contains “no experts, just so-called ordinary people,” Burns said.

Its thesis will be that “in the face of extraordinary circumstances, there are no ordinary people,” he added.

In an earlier interview, Burns said his film’s breakdown of home front to front lines is about 20/80. The four towns are Waterbury, Conn.; Mobile, Ala.; Sacramento, Calif.; and Luverne, Minn.

“We get to know the towns, we get to know the cross streets, we get to know the addresses where our people live,” he said. “We get to know the movie theaters where those who stayed behind will watch in horror what is happening to the young men.

“Most of all, we send those young men off into hell, not to “The Good War’ of the subsequent Madison Avenue-like promotion of the war. This is not just the black-and-white, but the horrible color extravaganza.”

More than 20 key battles will be dissected in detail, and viewers will care “precisely because you have a dog in this fight” via the small-town focus, Burns said.

The evident risk in this approach is alienating everybody who sees history through The Great Man lens.

“The War” forgoes “the normal heroes of the Second World War films,” Burns said. “I think sometimes too much emphasis is placed on presidents, fuehrers, field marshals, prime ministers and the famous generals. Don’t get me wrong, these people pass across our stage. But everyone we talk to is a so-called ordinary person, somebody you could’ve had Thanksgiving with.”

And, he added, “We spend more time in what the experience of a particular battle was, what it felt like to be in them, than we do exploring the History Channel preoccupation with armaments.”

Burns understands that “The War” follows an uptick in Hollywood interest in World War II.

From “Saving Private Ryan” to HBO’s “Band of Brothers” to this year’s “Flags of Our Fathers,” filmmakers’ fascination for the topic appears bottomless.

Unfortunately, that apparently hasn’t furthered understanding of the topic.

“If you stopped the projector in a theater anywhere in the United States at the end of (“Saving Private Ryan’s’) magnificent landing at D-Day and said, “What day is it? Where are we? What were the consequences of this landing? Why did we choose this landing here? Who are the Allies? What is the Axis?’, a majority of Americans couldn’t tell you.”