Platoon (1986)

Vietnam. FUBAR!!

I've read a couple of reviews that downgraded this film as being unrealistic. Of, course only the most sensational aspects of the war are portrayed. Duh, it's a movie. I wasn't over there. The war mercifully ended weeks before I would have been. I do have numerous friends who were. Many will not really talk about it (just like my dad who served 4 years in WWII and saw heavy action. Only after his death have I realized how scarred he was by that experience). I know a guy who used to tell me horror stories similar to those portrayed in this movie. 10 years ago he would tell these stories like jokes and laugh like crazy. I would think "That is one hardcore SOB!" Nowadays he can't talk about Vietnam without breaking down and sobbing and crying. I can see now that he has been living in hell for 30+ years. Maybe this film is unrealistic in the fact that this wasn't the average soldier's experience. I think about 50,000 or so just got killed. This crap did happen though. October 6, 2008

lame

Rather than being about the Vietnam war as it really was, this film is basically an exercise in what America wants the vietnam war to be. Despite endless comments to the contrary, there is nothing "realistic" about the film. The characters and plot are almost cartoonish. Its like a postmodernist John Wayne movie with different politics.

In real life, things don't break down into "good" soldiers and "evil" soldiers. Real life and real people are about shades of grey. The war also changed over time. Oliver Stone served in 1967 but the movie is often showing situations that were more out of 1971 with which he had no personal experience.

What a real film about vietnam would show is ordinary people doing a tough job day after day and doing the best they could. Its not about archtype evil officers, good/evil "father" figures and long political monologues.

About the only thing this film got right were the uniforms. September 6, 2008

Truly Essential for War flick buffs.

Actually, a must have for anyone who enjoys a good picture. All star cast, great story, truly moving in an emotional sense (watch the Bunker Scene, with Smokey Robinson's "Tracks of My Tears"). WATCH THIS MOVIE!!

Gonzo August 16, 2008

A Must See...

Its an Oliver Stone Semi-Autobiographical of his time in Vietnam. Throw in Dale Dye as a Technical Advisor a man that served 3 tours in Nam with 31 engagements and you can bet the film is as real as it gets in its accounts on man vs everything thrown at him.

This is my favorite movie and has been since I seen it.

God Bless everyone that served in Vietnam. August 6, 2008

The stars... there's no right or wrong in them. They're just there

Oliver Stone directed this powerful film about the Viet Nam War. It is dedicated to the soldiers who fought there, but it depicts a horrible morass, a moral quagmire, that questions the mission, and our whole involvement in that sorry chapter in our nation's history. I saw the Viet Nam memorial in Washington, D.C., and it is very moving, and a fitting monument to that war. It is just a black stone wall with lots of names, the numerous soldiers who died there. Why is that so fitting? It is a black wall, something that tore our country apart, and something as incomprehensible as a black wall.

Oliver Stone has an unaccredited cameo here, but I recognized him. He is the Alpha Company major in bunker. A young Charlie Sheen plays Chris Taylor, an idealistic youth who has volunteered to fight in Viet Nam, but who never bargained for what he got there.

[Referring to Vietnam]
Chris Taylor: Somebody once wrote: "Hell is the impossibility of reason." That's what this place feels like. Hell.

Later on, after struggling to survive for what seems like an eternity, he has this to say:

Chris Taylor: Day by day I struggle to maintain not only my strength but also my sanity. It's all a blur. I have no energy to write. I don't know what's right or wrong anymore. The morale of the men is low, a civil war in the platoon. Half the men with Elias, half with Barnes. There's a lot of suspicion and hate. I can't believe we're fighting each other, when we should be fighting them.

Willem Dafoe plays Sgt. Elias, and Tom Berenger is Sgt. Barnes. A monumental clash of the titans ensues, a battle between good and evil. But in the chaos and violence of Viet Nam, it is hard to tell which is which.

Sgt. Barnes: Saddle up! Lock and load!

The cast also includes future Oscar winner Forest Whitaker, Johnny Depp, Francesco Quinn, Kevin Dillon, John C. McGinley, and Mark Moses. I didn't recognize Johnny Depp at all, but John C. McGinley, who played Sgt. Red O'Neill, is the obnoxious Dr. Cox from the TV program Scrubs. Mark Moses has been on Desperate Housewives. Kevin Dillon is the younger brother of Matt Dillon. He is a very shocking character who seems completely without a moral compass. Sheen is seen every day on Two and a Half Men, which is now in syndication.

Several of the actors wrote messages on their helmets worn throughout the movie. 'Charlie Sheen' 's helmet reads, "When I die, bury me upside-down, so the world can kiss my ***", while Johnny Depp's simply reads, "Sherilyn", a tribute to Sherilyn Fenn, whom Depp was dating at the time. Mark Moses (Lt. Wolfe) had on his helmet a drawing of MAD magazine mascot Alfred E. Neuman with the phrase "What, me worry?" and, according to Tom Berenger, this caused Oliver Stone to laugh hysterically once during filming. Another reference to Sherilyn Fenn can be seen on Johnny Depp's guitar in the scene where they are smoking dope: the carved initials S.F. In many U.S. military leadership classes, the character of Lt. Wolfe is used as an example of how not to behave as a junior officer.

Charlie Sheen is of course the son of actor Martin Sheen, who also appeared in an epic film about Viet Nam, Apocalypse Now. Apocalypse Now was loosely based on Conrad's Heart of Darkness, but Platoon was written by Stone based on his own experience in Nam. Oliver Stone served in Viet Nam, where he was awarded a Bronze Star for Gallantry and a Purple Heart. Platoon is therefore the first major film about Viet Nam directed by a veteran. Stone wanted to tell what it was really like to counter the false image portrayed in John Wayne's The Green Berets. Platoon was an early success, winning the Oscar for best picture, and best director for Oliver Stone. Both Willem Dafoe and Tom Berenger received nominations for playing the two Sergeants who are polar opposites, good and evil, or evil and good. Platoon also did well at the box office.

FILMS DIRECTED BY OLIVER STONE

Nixon (1995)
Natural Born Killers (1994)
Heaven & Earth (1993)
JFK - Special Edition Director's Cut (1991)
The Doors (Special Edition) (1991)
Wall Street (1987)
Salvador (Special Edition) (1986)

Major League and Major League II starred both Tom Berenger and Charlie Sheen. The entire cast was reunited for the sequel except Wesley Snipes, who thought he was too big for his part by then, and was therefore skewered mercilessly by director David S. Ward. In the game of making someone's name into a verb, after a faux pas or something, how about tax evasion being known as Wesley Sniping? Shooting someone in the face with a shotgun could be Dick Chaneying. Getting drunk and disorderly could be Andy Dicking around, and drunk driving is Shia LaBeoufing.

Martin Scorsese's The Last Temptation of Christ (Director's Cut) [Import, All-region] (Dvd) (1988) .... Willem Dafoe portrayed Jesus
Wild At Heart (1990) .... Bobby Peru is like the opposite of Christ, if not quite the Antichrist.

Sgt. Elias: I love this place at night. The stars... there's no right or wrong in them. They're just there. July 29, 2008

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