Product Description

Studio: Paramount Home Video Release Date: 01/10/2006

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #41706 in DVD
• Brand: Paramount
• Released on: 2006-01-10
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Color, DVD, Full Screen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 150 minutes

Amazon.com
This lively documentary portrays one of the 20th century's most fascinating figures, a shy girl who would grow up to spend 30 years as the most powerful woman in America. Eleanor Roosevelt, who came to be both loved and hated by millions, grew up in a troubled home, losing both parents when she was young yet somehow developing a sense of compassion she would bring to a long career in public life. Her marriage to a young rising star of American politics, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, was deeply troubled, and this documentary reveals the personal betrayal that was assiduously kept hidden from public view during their lifetimes. Standing by her husband, Eleanor became, in the assessment of historians who speak on camera, one of the most skillful politicians of her time. Using early archival photographs to illustrate her early life, and extensive newsreel footage to document her decades on the public stage, the role of Mrs. Roosevelt in pioneering causes and expanding the traditional duties of the First Lady is presented in a very entertaining and informative manner. Extensive interviews with descendants, friends, and scholars also contribute to an incisive look at the woman who inspired the nation during the depths of the Depression, comforted Americans during World War II, and, after President Roosevelt's death, played a pivotal role in America's prominence at the United Nations. --Robert J. McNamara

Customer Reviews

What a woman she was!
As a history minor in college and one who has remained very interested in the field, I have occasionally read material about Eleanor Roosevelt. However, it was always on the periphery of my main interests, so I had no idea what I was missing until I saw this tape. She was one of the most dynamic and influential people that this country has produced. Having had a miserable childhood, where even her mother commented that she was ugly, she seemed destined to take up a life as a dutiful wife to a successful husband. However, and fortunately, that was not to be as she found herself and began a life of activism that made her enemies, but also made her the most powerful woman of the first half of the twentieth century. In many ways, she was the perfect counter to her husband, as she could go out and take the heat for actions that FDR simply could not do.
In this tape, stocked with newsreel footage, photographs and interviews with relatives and family friends, you learn much about what drove her to succeed. As seems so common, it was partly due to deep-seated feelings of early inadequacy and her hectic pace was the preventive cure from having to stop and perhaps be overcome by depression. Nothing is kept from you, even the supposedly platonic love affairs she had with men and women.
Her relationship with FDR was interesting, but probably not all that unique. As the story unfolds, it reminds you in many ways of the relationship that must exist between Bill and Hillary Clinton. Certainly, if times had been different, Eleanor could also have served in Congress.
Eleanor Roosevelt was one of the bravest, most dedicated people the world has ever seen. Sure she made enemies, but being hated by the likes of bigoted segregationists and J. Edgar Hoover is a point of commendation. The most interesting fact in the tapes is that Hoover hated her and her FBI file is one of the thickest on record. But then, so is her record of achievement.

"Misunderstood First Lady"
A very interesting biography. Through interviews with friends and family members and extensive excerpts of her own writings and quotes, the viewer will come to know facts about Mrs. Roosevelt not known before. Scorned by her mother and betrayed by her father and husband, she was a remarkable woman nonetheless. Although rich in material things, she was very fragile emotionally. Watching this video will convince the viewer that Mrs. Roosevelt was this country's most controversial and hardest-working First Lady.

"FIRST LADY OF THE 20th CENTURY"
I have found the entire PBS American Experience series to be nothing short of excellent, both in the accuracy of the historical facts of it's subjects as well as the candid and plain truth about their lives, all in unvarnished detail. The latest one I purchased and watched was on Eleanor Roosevelt, the First Lady of FDR and the Champion of Human Rights for all People. Both educational as well as fascinating, if you are a history buff and are intrigued by the gifted lives and legacies of these historical figures whose stories are told in a rich narrative accompanied by a beautiful and awesomely appropriate musical sountrack, then any one episode of this series is for you!! I now own PBS AE documentaries on Bobby Kennedy, Jackie Kennedy, LBJ, Harry Truman, Jimmy Carter, Huey Long, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, Malcolm X, Teddy Roosevelt, Mao Tse Tung, as well as a couple of others I can't recall at the moment! Do yourself a favor history lover, get a copy of the life stories well told of one of these great people of the past and present, you won't regret it!