Customer Reviews

FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE

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I much anticipated this movie, but when I had seen it I was much disappointed. It begins with Florence getting off the train to go to her home (her actual home, in the movie). Then we are treated to interminable flashbacks, and returns to the present (which present?), in such dizzying sequence that one becomes confused and disoriented. It tells the story of her post-Scutari struggles with the British government, her sense of guilt that she could have - and should have - done more to help the troops in the early days of her time at Scutari, and her pressure for a Royal Commission into the conduct of military healthcare. Her agitations even bring her to an interview with Queen Victoria, but most significantly it shows her own father as the one who restores her to sanity from a sense of overburdening guilt.
With all the confused flitting around various time periods and arrays of snapshots it does not give a coherent account of the Nightingale story. For instance, it shows nothing of her time in Germany in the early 1850s, or her London experience before setting out for Scutari. The best I can say is that it is a useful adjunct to the far superior Jaclyn Smith - Timothy Dalton version. The producer explains that the movie was done on a low budget. Indeed, and it shows!

This recently made one hour movie (2008) about Florence Nightingale is excellent. It is an extremely accurate account of her life. Viewers are advised to review information about Nightingale's life story before watching this movie. Highly recommend this movie above all others based on Nightingale's life.