Ken Burns: Cancer/The Emperor of all Maladies-Non Fiction 3 Discs PBS Ken Burns's latest film examines cancer with a cellular biologist's precision, a historian's perspective and a biographer's passion. It is the longest running war in human history. Fought with razor-sharp scalpels, invisible rays, and lethal poisons, its battlegrounds are deep within the human cell. The story of the war on cancer spans centuries and continents. Cancer: The Emperor of all Maladies, based on the Pulitzer-Prize winning book by Siddhartha Mukherjee, tells the complete story of cancer, from its first appearance in the fossilized remains of dinosaurs to the gleaming laboratories of modern research institutions. The film interweaves a sweeping historical documentary: with intimate profiles of current patients; and an investigation into the latest scientific breakthroughs that may have brought us, at long last, to the brink of effective treatments.