RICHARD Bryson’s pick of the DVDs out to buy this week is the epic mini-series The Pacific, a ten-part box set from HBO.

The Pacific [DVD, HBO, �29.99)

A box set that contains all ten parts of this mini-series that (like Band of Brothers) delivers a realistic portrait of the soldier’s view of World War II.

If all war is hell the fighting in the Pacific, against an enemy willing to die and never surrender, must have been the most nightmarish ordeal.

Here the war (filmed in the slightly bleached-out sepia feel of Band of Brothers) is seen through the intertwined odysseys of three U.S. Marines - Robert Leckie, John Basilone and Eugene Sledge.

The extraordinary experiences of these men and their fellow Marines take them from the haunted jungles of Guadalcanal, through the impenetrable rain forests of Cape Gloucester, across the blasted coral strongholds of Peleliu, up the black sand terraces of Iwo Jima, through the killing fields of Okinawa and to the triumphant, yet uneasy, return home after V-J Day.

It’s one incredible, savage journey and there’s more than 400 minutes of action on these discs.