329-2012--Week 11 Questions/Comments

Things the movie got right
I like how the fact that because the movie was made in 1946 about 1946, all of the material culture is correct as well as the settings. That really helps in making the story believable. The struggles of these veterans coming home are also very accurately portrayed. A lot of these veterans had missed years of their children growing up and they missed spending time with their wives. They had problems finding jobs, struggled with alcoholism, and came home to families who could function independently without them. As a result, they had to find a way to fit back into the family, which a lot of time caused emotional stress and sometimes, divorce. I think this was one of the most accurate films that we have seen, however, this is partly because there weren’t any specific events that were interpreted, but rather a representation of a group on individuals trying to find a place again in society. –Paige The discussion of the Selective Service Act was accurate in this film. Al was able to come back and get a better job at his bank, while Fred could not get his exact same job because the business has changed hands. The G.I Bill was dealt with correctly as well through Al since he oversaw this part of the bank. Our discussion in class made it seem as if it was really easy to get the loans, but the men still needed collateral in the film version, which made it more difficult. I also liked the way the film portrayed how Fred had PTSD or Veterans Chronic Stress Syndrome through his nightmare. This would have been how many men suffered from this disorder. -Amanda&#160; I thought the film did a nice job of depicting soldiers returning to different social classes. '''War allows soldiers to look beyond socioeconomic differences and even age gaps when deployed. Only when the three men return is their different life stages highlighted''' (the most prominent example is that Al's daughter is old enough to be a love interest for Fred). --Ellen S. I am shocked that they not only had a '''disabled veteran in the movie, but that he had one of the most profound parts. I do wish they had shown his arms in the scene where his father had to remove them. Either way though, I felt like it was a big step for this time'''. We see just about everything we talked about in class, though, besides the things I mention in the next section. Housing, GI Bill, unemployment fears, servicemen taking civilian jobs, communist fears, etc. -- Brooke I think the film did a good job of depicting some of the difficulties that returning soldiers had reentering society after the war: the disabled veteran seemed to have accepted his handicap until he came home, Mr. Stevenson also appeared to have developed alcoholism since his return, and Fred struggled to find a job. -WD I really did like how the perspective of the solider was integrated into the film. Not only the alcoholism issue as said above, but the potential effects of PTSD and other issues (such as integrating back into families) that would have and do face when returning home. pmccloy Well obviously the material culture was all correct which was refreshing. I thought the film did a good job of portraying the civilians’ uncertainty as to how to help their loved ones reintegrate to life at home. The patience of Al’s wife contrasts sharply with Frank’s wife telling him to “just stop thinking about the war.” The movie did a good job of showing, in a short time, a lot of the troubles faced by couples, married or not. ~ Laura-Michal The film did a good job depicting the impact of the war&#160;on&#160;returning veterans, their families and postwar society as a whole. Being filmed in 1946, the film displays what is acutally being experienced at that exact point in history. --Mary O. '''This movie was the most accurate movie we have watched this semester. Nearly all of the major topics we discussed on Tuesday made its way into the movie.''' The movie was a perfect mixture of historical accuracy and interesting story, neither aspect dominated the other and the movie flowed effortlessly where nothing seemed forced. This movie for me has become the gold standard for what an historically accurate movie should be. The movie accurately represents the people who would have watched this movie in the theaters. While the movie had the advantage of being created during the time it was portraying it is nonetheless an instant classic that is sure to put a smile on an historian’s face. - Jason Milton • '''Good representation of the reluctance of many to return home because of overwhelming emotion and fear. Also, good depiction of how the military worked hard to heal physical wounds, but did little to prepare soldiers emotionally for what to expect and how to deal with life after homecoming'''. • Though it was very heavy-handed, the movie very accurately depicted how''' many returning veterans self-medicated with alcohol. This remains a significant problem with today’s returning veterans.''' • The film did a good job at representing the fear that civilians had of returning soldiers jeopardizing their jobs. • “Don’t call me sir. I was a Sergeant.” (That’s a VERY accurate military phrase! The term “Sir” is reserved for use with officers. • Really good attention to detail with the “Ruptured Duck” (Honorable Discharge) lapel pin.  - Sara G.  The movie shows the after effects of war on the soldiers pretty accurately. It shows the men having flashbacks and the adjustment period for both the family members and the soldiers. Al drinks excessively once he returns home as a way to cope. Homer has to deal with people, even his own family, feeling uncomfortable around him and his new hands, which people often feel uneasy around persons with disabilities. --Olivia The captain gets offered his job back, which is an example of how things were with the GI Bill. Similar to what everyone else said, this movie did really well in terms of accuracy. The feelings the three main charcters felt was expressed during the movie. “well, nobodys job is safe with all these service men coming in.” This is exactly how the civilians felt when veterans came home and needed their jobs back. There are several times when the veteran comes home and is surprised to see the dynamic and new interests in the family dynamics —Aqsa Z. I thought that the way in which Peggy and her mother were hardly phased by anything right after the men returned home was a different way to show how many women had been forced to adapt to life without a husband/father. Admitedly, I was a bit surprised at some aspects of Peggy's character since this was after all 1946--the way in which she put Fred to bed in the beginning, and later announcing that she was going to break up his marriage--but if the film was actually made in that time about tht time, perhaps it's indicative that their sense of propriety and practicality were not what we imagine them to be at first?--Mary Quinn '''This movie got so much right because it wasn't based on a historically famous biography. It correctly captured the locations, times, culture, and attire because it required 0% effort to do so. I'm positive if this film was based in any time but the one it was filmed and it had been about any historical figure, the producers would have demanded far more inaccuracies.''' Also the fact that many stories were dealt with left less time for inaccuracies to creep in. A big issue with "PTSD" and soldiers returning home is that they might not have a "home" anymore. It might seem completely different. Their families could have moved on. The film portrayed this all very well. -- Sam R.

'''The beginning of the film gives this sense that the men can hardly wait to get home but when they do they much rather be with familiar company. There is this constant struggle through the film of adjusting back to life just because they know they have to when deep down they really yearned for camaraderie that came with the military lifestyle.''' --Rachel T.

Things the movie got wrong
 RACIAL DIVERSITY This movie did not show any diversity or address issues of minority experiences in the war. While this may not necessarily be wrong within the film story, it is something that could have been incorporated. -Amanda&#160; The only two things missing for me were African American servicemen (and in general) and Rosie The Riveter-style women. I think I saw one or two African Americans in the first few scenes, but after that, it’s like they disappeared all together. For women, they were all glam and doing women’s work—even during the war. Where are the women who were in industry, etc.? -- Brooke I saw two blacks in the whole movie and they were a maid and a baggage boy. I didn't see too many Rosie types or minorities. -Hannah

Like you three mentioned ^ the film was desperately lacking in the diversity department. A movie filmed in 1946, about 1946 should have included (or at least&#160;touched on)&#160;racial&#160;conflicts and diversity considering there were many issues surrounding the two in postwar society. --Mary O.

A lot of these films seem to want to ignore the impact African Americans play in the greater picture. This film is no different. -JRemy

There was a scene when Fred was in the drug store talking to the pharmacist about getting a job. The camera cuts to a man and a woman talking about the veterans coming and getting the jobs back and the woman gives him a look. That is the only thing that I could imagine being a woman in the work place within this film, since it seemed like she was working in the store. (and this could very well be a stretch.....) Kayle P '''There was certainly a lack of diversity in this movie, but I think there several reasons for this. Consider the film as a primary source: blacks in 1946 often were not given the respect of other vets, and were second-class citizens in the movie industry.''' Also, I think the intention of this film is to tell a specific story, that of the struggles of vets as they reintegrated with their families, not to tell the story of every returning vet ever. If you want to focus on three specific families, it makes sense not to give a lot of detail to supporting characters. --Stef L. We saw no real evidence of NAACP activity. Their "Double V" campaign was popular during the war and they continued to be very active after the war, quite possibly more so. Almost another white washing of history, but this time it has more ACTUAL HISTORY. --NJenn Due to the way Hollywood was set up in 1946, I wasn't surprised in the lack of diversity in the film. However, the filmmakers clearly wanted to accurately portray the culture, and this was a prominent growing cultural issue at the time (both in terms of race and gender). Clearly in pre-production the decision was made to exclude. In other words, it's hard to accurately portray 1964 and NOT include these issues. -- Sam R. OTHER ISSUES I thought it was really weird that Mr. Stevenson was concerned whether or not his daughter had been informed about the Birds and the Bees after he found out she was going steady with someone, as if he wouldn't have been surprised if she was sexually active. Social values during the 1940s were very conservative. I feel like most parents back then would've put their daughters on lockdown if they suspected her of engaging in premarital...intimacy. '''I also was not sure if Mr. Stevenson was being sarcastic when he said that most of the enlisted men were old like him. A lot of young men got swept up with patriotic fever when nWWII started so it's unlikely that Mr. Stevenson only saw men his age.''' -WD When Fred cannot find a job he makes no mention of getting the one year of unemployment pay from the government covered under the G.I. Bill. '''Also since Fred mentions that he did not have any skills, the free education covered by the G.I. Bill should have been mentioned. Fred would have been a prime candidate to use the G.I. Bill in order to increase his ability to find a good paying job.''' - Jason Milton '''Al Stephenson was given a promotion and a raise after he returned from service. As we discussed many employers wouldn't have done that and many veterans were left without jobs. Those who did get their old jobs back were pretty much only guaranteed the position they had when they left. Not &#160;sure that this is a decent representation of the time in this aspect.''' &#160;--NJenn I was '''surprised to hear Al ask the soldier applying for the farm loan about what collateral he had to offer up to secure the loan. I thought the whole premise of the GI Bill was that the loans were secured by the VA.''' - Sara G. WOMEN'S ROLES This is not bout so much what was wrong, but rather what there was a lack of. Although there were a number of women portrayed in the film, there were no Rosie Riveters? The closest to women to war time activities, might be seen to be Peggy, who worked at a hospital, but even that was on the home front and there was no indication on how many civilians verse servicemen/ women, she encountered. pmccloy This isn't so much what the movie got wrong but what the movie glaringly did not address. While each returning soldier had a woman to come home to, the women's experiences of readjusting to their men coming home was simplified in to either the good wife/girlfriend accepting their husbands no matter what or the vain night club going wife who gives up on her war hero of a husband because he can't adjust to life back on the home front. Each relationship had its problems but the problems were centered around the men, not the challenges each spouse would have had to readjusting to civilian life.-Kendall I agree with Kendall. I thought that it was almost like the women knew what behavior to expect from their husbands coming home from the war, rather than learning how to adjust from them being away for so long. ~Kayle P '''I thought it was weird that after Fred drinks too much that Peggy was left to take care of him and put him to bed. She unbuckles his belt and takes his shoes off. She is a young single women and he is a married man. In the 1940's it seems even more inappropriate at that time than it would today.''' --Olivia '''It was interesting that only one of the couples got divorced since divorce was relatively common following the war. If Fred's wife hadnt been portrayed as such a crappy person it would have been a good representation of how the war pulled couples apart'''. All the other women were willing to put up with most anything from their husbands, which may not have always been the case. -Rachel T.

'''In reality, all women of 1946 were either angels of patience who seemed to unconditionally love their man or else they were self absorbed hell-bats. Oh wait, that's just in this film.''' -- Sam R.

The movie as a primary source about the time/people who made it
'''This movie is one of the most accurate primary sources we have seen. Not only was the movie made at the same time it is portrayed, but also it is a story about soldiers who were coming home, when they were coming home. In a sense, it gave many of the soldiers who were struggling getting back into peacetime society hope that they would be all right'''. —Paige The thing about this movie is that it's a primary and a secondary source mixed into one. But when I looked at it from 2012, it was pretty clear what people were thinking about in 1946, and what their fears were once the Axis had been defeated. The guy at the soda fountain who got in the fight with Homer pretty accurately showed the undercurrents of government distrust at the time, which I thought foreshadowed the rise of McCarthyism and the hunt for people deemed "un-American." Al's son talked about his concerns about attaching nuclear weapons to jet-propelled, radar-guided missiles; 10 years later, people were digging nuclear fallout shelters in their basements and backyards. So it sort of felt like a primary source from 1946 that almost dealt with secondary source events that hadn't happened yet, if that makes sense. --Carrie I do like this film as a primary source about the time in which it was filmed because it was so obvious they were struggling. The lack of diversity, the way the families interacted not knowing what was going to come next; it was a deeper meaning that movies looking back do not have. -JRemy Going along with what Carrie pointed out, '''it was obvious that the fear of economic depression was rampant. The uncertainty of the future was communicated well.''' War at least had provided a comfort for the homefront by giving it a specific role (support their boys fighting overseas). Now with thousands of soldiers returning home, the American homefront feared the stability they had seemed to reach during wartime would crack. --Ellen S. This has been my favorite movie this semester. I think the movie did a really good job of addressing a lot of the issues returning soldiers came home to after the war but at the same time it was very blatant to me the pro-American sentiment behind the movie. The scene in the drug store where Fred loses his job for punching the customer who talks bad about the reasoning behind the war. The film seemed to be trying to justify the challenges soldiers were facing returning from war as well as providing templates for how the American public should react to these challenges.-Kendall People had mixed feelings about soldiers coming home. They were worried about their jobs and about "widespread depression and unemployment." When companies took over they were not obligated to give jobs back to servicemen. Servicemen didn't know how to adjust to families and had nightmares about the war. Families struggled with how to deal with disabilities. Many wanted to keep the "Americanism" and were worried about changing America. After the war, goods were more accessible to the public and consumerism increased. I also liked how the movie predicted the chaos nuclear bombs would bring. - Hannah As Hannah said about the issue and fear of loosing work.'''I really like how they integrated that concern in the first scene at the Drugstore when one of the workers commented on how no ones jobs are secure. But also the potential issues that servicemen had finding jobs, in the case of Fred, if their previous place of employment was bought out.''' pmccloy '''This film is clearly a much better primary source than the others we have watched, mostly because they weren’t worrying about being a secondary source. The problems portrayed, 40’s acting styles aside, seem to have an intensity and earnest quality that I don’t see in a lot of other movies from this time. ''This film would have resonated strongly with audiences, and there were lots of little “throw away lines” about how no one was safe with service men coming back to take jobs, and the economy was about to fall again. These represent the general ideas of the time, and the fact that they are spoken by second or third tier characters gives them a legitimacy that they would not have had otherwise.' ~ Laura-Michal I agree with Stef's point that the lack of diversity in the film can be explained. Admitedly, the film does not narrate a number of different experiences from WWII, but at the same time the film's intention is to follow 3 specific narratives, and not to try and be all-encompassing. Now, this could beg the question of why wasn't one of the charcaters which the movie followed of a racial minority, though perhaps that point indicates that the film is a product of its time and not actually 'inacurate.' I also wonder which of the three storylines could have been eliminated, since together they did cover a lot of socioeconomic as well as personal ground. '''Would adding a fourth storyline have been prudent? I think that the one thing that the film could be accused of is specificity.''' --Mary Quinn

Comments on the reading versus the movie
One thing that I noticed that was missing between the movie and the readings was the emotions. In the film, the main focus is three veterans trying to find their way back into the relationships they had before the war. Homer, Fred, and Al struggled with love in relationships. However, in the reading the emotion that we see is anger: anger at the ineffectiveness of the army of discharging soldiers, and the anger of having to deal with people who didn’t understand what these veterans had gone through. –Paige I agree with Paige that there wasn't much anger expressed by any of the characters, but I wonder how much that was Hollywood not wanting to alienate audiences and how much was comes from the fact that we only read one veteran's experiences and opinions. I did think that Homer, Fred, and Al did express signs that the war had hurt them in various ways, through emotional distance from friends and family, difficulties in holding steady or fulfilling jobs, and quiet alcoholism. --Carrie I think'''the movie captures Paul Fussell testimony regarding identity. Fussell talks about how his annoyance grows into anger over "accepting invitations to make too many changes of identity too fast" (211), which I think is shown in the film, especially through Al'''. There is that scene when he looks at himself in the mirror and his photograph from before the war. He is obviously upset that the two images don't match, but is not sure which one he should keep. He eventually returns to his banker, family man self, but only because he feels he must, which is why he turns to alcoholism. Fred is similar in this respect, trying to become the man his wife wants him to be. When she says that he looks more like himself in uniform than in his suit, his face changes because he obviously views himself as a civilian rather than a soldier. These issues of identity are problematic because these men have changed, but must return to environments and people who still anticipate them to be as they were before the war. -Amanda&#160;

“I became wildly opposed to any manifestation of censorship, which had been responsible for shielding Americans from the adult facts of the terrible war they’d been presumably engaged in.” I found this to be true. It’s true in the sense that, many veterans such as Homer and the captain felt that no one really understands what the war is really like. Similar to earlier in the reading, many people back in the homefront, just associate the war with the nationalism and patriotism and a social scene; but the veterans knew it was much more than that. For them, the devastating effects of the war were with them forever afterwards. --Aqsa Z.