New Film Explores Challenges Facing Disabled Women Veterans
Alexis wants to get off painkillers. Mariette jumps at loud noises. BriGette won’t leave her home. Lashonna does not have one. Female soldiers who served as drivers and gunners in today’s frontless wars are bringing home physical and invisible injuries. SERVICE follows these women as they struggle to find out who they are now. SERVICE: When Women Come Marching Home is a multi-platform documentary that follows returning female service members and longtime veterans as they deal with readjusting back into civilian culture and their physical and psychological wounds such as limb amputation, military sexual trauma, service dogs and so much more.
An award-winning team of Director, Marcia Rock and Composer, Patricia Lee Stotter, brilliantly take you deep into the lives of several female veterans ranging in service times of the 1990’s to the current war on terror in Iraq and Afghanistan by following these women over a two-and-a-half-year time span.
The idea for the film was born when the two women met while working on a film about women in Africa. Stotter had been working with veterans on a variety of projects in New York City and Rock was researching disability issues on whether the U.S. was ready for all of the wounded warriors who were returning permanently disabled by Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs). When they realized they had a mutual interest, they decided to create a film and cross platform project about disabled veterans whose transition from active duty had been eased with the help of service dogs.
Rock and Stotter have been joined at the hip since beginning this venture. A huge shift in their focus came when they met Sue Downes and Alexis Courneen, female veterans with amazing stories of triumph and heartache. Rock and Stotter quickly realized that female veterans had unique issues, injuries and insights into their military experience, compared to those of their male counterparts. They also became increasingly aware about the lack of gender-specific support and care for these women and noticed their stories of triumph and tragedy were rarely covered by the national press that is except for the occasional report on Military Sexual Trauma (MST). So much of their stories are about the bond of sisterhood under duress and under attack.They immediately set up a website (www.servicethefilm.com) and Facebook group so they could network with veterans and truly understand the issues these women were facing first- hand, while providing an interactive peer-to-peer support group and outreach avenue for women vets.
The details of the film will start to become clear when you visit their website. You can watch the videos and listen to podcast interviews with women veterans, psychologicalists and dog trainers. Trailers about each veteran are available as well as links to resources and all kinds of information designed to support female service members, veterans, as well as being a resource for their families, friends and communities.
The documentary shows the challenges of these vets, but also the women’s resourcefulness. Alexis and Sue get service dogs and new legs; Mariette and Alicia go to college; BriGette finds community online; and Lashonna gets off the streets and into a home. Two of the vets confide in each other the horror and damage of the most pernicious issue facing one out of three women who have served: Military Sexual Trauma. Through their intimate conversation, we experience their horrific abuse up close and personal. The film and the veterans address how difficult it often is for women to find safety and a support system within the male dominated military culture, especially when at war. All of the
women move on, not getting over their physical and hidden disabilities, but by finding ways to live with them.
We are with these women when they go to therapy, to class, to the VA and when they are refused service because they have a service dog. We visit a functioning VA women’s clinic in Seattle and follow our women all the way to Capitol Hill (Washington, DC) where they advocate for the rights of all veterans.
The film is starting to be screened now. We are eager to have anyone interested in seeing it contact the producers at www.servicethefilm.com.
