The Life and Times of Rosie the Riveter

You should find this interesting if you have an interest in learning about the social issues that were going on in the U.S. during WWII. You won't read about the subject of this film in any history book. Both from a feminist and a racial perspective. Admittedly, I wasn't born yet. So I wasn't a witness. But I had just always assumed that during WWII all of the prejudices had been put aside for the country to pull together. At least that's what certain aspects of historical propaganda had led me to believe. But this film set me straight. My mother and father were both a part of that generation. They're both gone now. The people of the country (and the world) endured a lot. From the Great Depression through the end of the war and much in between. Watching this showed me why my mother and my grandmother were so strong.

Excellent research that rescues collective memories of the United States and of the struggle of the American woman to gain access to the labour world. A most laudable work of love to preserve those memories of American history by filmmaker Connie Field, as told by those who were protagonists: in this case, the director reconstructs the symbol of "Rosie", as five American working women tell their stories, when they took the posts left by men who went to the front during Second World War, and who were later displaced from their jobs, when the battle was over, the men returned and claimed their positions. A must see.

This is by far, the best documentary on the American home front during the Second World War. It's also an excellent and extremely entertaining look at the spark that ignited the women's liberation movement nearly thirty years before it 'officially' planted its roots. With thousands of men leaving the factories to fight in the war, and with the urgent, escalating need for America to arm itself, women were strongly encouraged to join the factory workforce. They came from all over the country and discovered skills they never knew they had, both as laborers, and as independent women. They were self-sufficient and strong (many of them endured double-shifts on a fairly regular basis), and they eventually discovered new freedoms by earning their own incomes and making their own choices on how to spend that money. Connie Field has created an extremely entertaining documentary that's choked full of interviews with women from all walks of life. She intersperses lots of the newsreel footage and the popular songs that had been created in order to encourage and inspire the female workforce. And she illustrates the myriad of ways in which women were discouraged from working after the war had ended, and how strong a role the media played in encouraging women to raise families and stay in the kitchen. This film is rare glimpse of the Second World War from the female perspective, and a vital document of American history.