Sally Field, Beau Bridges, Ron Leibman

In an Oscar-winning performance, Sally Field is unforgettable as Norma Rae, the Southern millworker who revolutionizes a small town and discovers a power in herself she never knew she had. Under the g...( read more  read more... )uidance of a New York unionizer (Ron Leibman) and with increasing courage and determination, Norma Rae organizes her fellow factory workers to fight for better conditions and wages. Based on a true story.

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77% liked it

5,692 ratings

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89% liked it

19 critics

PG, 1 hr. 50 min.

Directed by: Martin Ritt

Release Date: March 2, 1979

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DVD Release Date: April 17, 2001

Stats: 200 reviews

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Flixster Reviews (200)


  • September 13, 2008
    Sally Field is such a very good actress and shines in: Norma Rae.

    Field plays Norma Rae whom lives in a very small town. Her livelihood depends on her job at the local and very established factory until one day things start to change for the worse. Norma then decides to take ...( read more)a stance and fight for a Union to get better compensation that is rightfully there's. This is an insiring film and Sally Field does a very good job with this role...very believable from start to finish....worth spending your time to see this 80's classic.
  • March 6, 2008
    wooo hoooo now boys it's Sally Field in a rootin tootin norma rae adventure!!!
  • March 4, 2008
    Sally Field gives a bright and forceful performance as Norma Rae, a cotton mill worker and single mother living with her parents, who also work at the mill. In fact, the mill is the town's main employer and, as such, sees fit to run roughshod over the rights of its employees. The...( read more) film does a good job of capturing the feel of the unpleasant environment in which these people work: machines clatter incessantly and are densely packed into the prison-like factory, creating a hot and noisy hell from which there are few opportunities to escape. And yet the film never really delves too deeply into the conflict between the workers and the management - which should have formed the core of the story - other than in a strictly conventional "good guys vs. bad guys" manner. All the management are depicted as mean-spirited and unsmiling, with no redeeming features, who stoop to phone tapping and incitement of racial hatred to try and foil the plans of Union representative Reuben Warshawsky (a sharp and edgy Ron Leibman) to win the work force over. Maybe it really happened like that, but the impression lingers that the makers deliberately depersonalised the management figures ? who are all peripheral ? in order to enhance the heroic status of their lead character. Warshawsky, with the help of Norma Rae, finds it tough going to convert the workers, attracting a group of only seventeen out of 800. Presumably this is because of the worker's fears of repercussions from the management, but again this is never really made clear, and there is little feeling of the awakening of a sleeping giant as the call for an organised union grows: one minute there are just a handful of recruits, the next the whole workforce is downing tools as Norma is hauled off to prison. This is in keeping with the jarring compression of the time scale in which the story takes place.
  • November 18, 2007
    Sally Field gave an excellent performance as a worker in a crappy factory who risks everything to improve the conditions there by unionizing.
  • July 7, 2007
    Norma Rae is an uplifting story of a woman starting the first union at a factory. I really got into it.
  • September 12, 2009
    It is very good. Made me think about things
  • August 18, 2009
    Sounds kind of like North Country.
  • July 26, 2009
    Entertaing and original drama about the development of a Union in a Alabama textile factory. What makes this film great is the relationship between Sally Field and Ron Leibman.Everyone in the film is good,but these two make the film.He is a New York Union organizer and she is a w...( read more)orker in the factory and the both establish a bond right away.They become very close and have a almost romantic relationship without any romantic liaisons,which was very original. The Union story is also very interesting and the film takes its time to develop characters and story.Great direction by Martin Ritt and beautifully photographed by John Alonzo.
  • July 23, 2009
    Sally Field makes her outstanding performance (she won her first Best Actress Oscar) as a southern textile work attempting to unionise the mill with the aid of organiser Ron Leibman. Film is based on a true story and has good eyes and ears for authenticity. Entire case is first r...( read more)ate.
  • April 2, 2009
    great script and an amazing performance by Field.

    good stuff. ♥

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Norma Rae Trivia


  • What state did the movie 'Norma Rae' take place in?  Answer »
  • Sally Field won an Oscar for her performance in which movie?  Answer »
  • Norma Rae (1979): What state does the union-organizing story take place in?  Answer »
  • Which actress connects the following films? - Forrest Gump - Soap Dish - Mrs. Doubtfire - Norma Rae   Answer »

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