Florence Nightingale
Film Analysis

The story happened in England in the early 1840s. According to the narrator, it was a time of only two classes: the fabulously wealthy or the very poor. As a member of the aristocratic gentry, young Florence Nightingale's life has been predetermined by tradition: she is to marry a suitable man of her class and become a mother. Any personal ambitions she may possess should be ignored as she pursues this singular goal. But Nightingale is a strong-willed woman and she knows what she wanted to achieve. She wants to learn. She wants to pursue a life of service to those less fortunate than herself as a result of a "calling" she's had since God spoke to her when she was 17. She saw the devastating conditions of a public "hospital" in Middlesex and decides to become a nurse, a situation that horrifies her mother and confuses her father because during that time, nurses were considered as harlots or of low class. She decides to attend the Kaiserswerth Institute in Germany, the first school of nursing, a decision that devastates Richard Milnes, who has courted Florence, and who has asked for her hand in marriage.At the hospital for Gentlewomen, she begins to put her theories concerning hygiene and good mental health into practice, even though she comes up against resistence to her new methods by the staff, particularly the stern, imposing Nurse Davis. Richard waited for Florence to answer his marriage proposal but eventually, he became impatient to which Florence finally issues a definitive, "No." She states she has passions just as Richard does, but if she decides to satisfy them, she'll do so outside of marriage. Florence's greatest test of courage comes with the outbreak of the Crimean War. When the Crimean War breaks out, Florence is taken aback at the horrifying reports coming from the British Army detailing the treatment of soldiers