Women sneak into Civil War

The documentary “Full Metal Corset: Secret Soldiers of the Civil War” (6 p.m. today, History) explores the unusual stories of women who impersonated men in order to fight in the Civil War.

As the experts interviewed here make clear, it took a very strong individual to buck the gender stereotypes of the era, when women were barred from military service, voting and most business affairs. The two women profiled here both defied their families’ wishes and escaped arranged marriages to much older men.

Sarah Emma Edmonds left her home in Canada and cut her hair to pass as a young man. She eventually enlisted in the Michigan Infantry Volunteers. Cuban-born Loretta Velazquez grew up idolizing Joan of Arc. After her husband, a Confederate officer, was killed at the outbreak of the Civil War, Velazquez cut her hair, donned a mustache, took the name Harry T. Buford and raised her own company of soldiers. In an odd quirk of history, both of these women fought at Bull Run on opposite sides of the battlefield.

¢ Believe it or not, I was a media cynic as a child. It dawned on me at a rather tender age that RCA (a manufacturer of color televisions) was in cahoots with the Wonderful World of Color to make us feel like losers for watching Disney programming on a black-and-white set.

So be forewarned, the gorgeously photographed, monthlong nature spectacular “Planet Earth” (7 p.m., 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. Sunday, Discovery, airing on consecutive Sundays through April 22) will probably make even the most reluctant technophobe covet those massive new high-definition sets.

Narrated by Sigourney Weaver, “Earth” is a work of cinematic wonder. It reflects the labor of more than 70 camera operators who spent a collective 2,000 days shooting from more than 200 locations. Some of these filmmakers waited for weeks and months to get the right shot. And many of the rare species highlighted on “Earth” have never been photographed before.

Every episode concludes with a brief behind-the-scenes look at the making of “Earth.” My favorite tale of hardship involves a camera crew spending weeks in a cave amidst tons of bat guano. Now that’s what I call dedication.

“Earth” skips from the Arctic to the rain forests, from clouds to caves and from whales to bugs and back again. After all, its subject is literally globe-spanning.

In this way, “Earth” reminds me of the spate of generalized history films that networks churned out as we approached the end of the last century and millennium. I remember slogging through films hosted by Peter Jennings trying to cover everything from the Crusades to Steven Spielberg. Sometimes a film about everything ends up covering nothing in particular depth.

Today’s highlights

¢ The NCAA basketball tournament (6 p.m., CBS) continues.

¢ Peyton Manning hosts “Saturday Night Live” (10:30 p.m., NBC), featuring musical guest Carrie Underwood.

Sunday’s highlights

¢ Scheduled on “60 Minutes” (6 p.m., CBS): an interview with ex-Tyco CEO Dennis Kozlowski; a terrorist laments.

¢ Scheduled on “Dateline” (6 p.m., NBC): Killers stalk the produce aisle.