Born To Kill or Born For The Thrill?

I have a love/hate relationship with war movies. I love when history is set into motion via the big screen, but war movies make me all emotional and Platoon and Full Metal Jacket were no different.

Full Metal Jacket was great. I’ve seen it before but I now have a greater appreciation for it after all the studying for the quiz. I loved Full Metal Jacket for the way it showed the breakdown of the human psyche. Platoon also shows the breakdown, but the two do it in very different ways. In Platoon you see how the jungle is a psychological weapon that the Viet Cong utilized without even really knowing it. In Full Metal Jacket the on set of psychological breakdown is depicted much earlier, beginning in PT and boot camp. I never really thought of the psychological effects of boot camp. I mean working out constantly while being yelled at by some crazy drill sergeant all while having the looming date of deployment hanging over your head…anyone could easily loose their mind. You also see the men’s need for a sense of belonging. The relationships between Joker, Cowboy and later Animal Mother, 8-ball and the rest of men pull you in and make you question how the hazing and ultimately death of Piles can happen. The men in combat are willing to risk their lives to bring the dead body of a fellow platoon mate from the battlefield, but in basic training they willing contribute to the downfall of another man?

Both the movies highlight the fact that many of the men who did fight in the War were the “bottom on the barrel” with occasional exceptions like Chris Taylor and James “Joker” Davis, who had the skills and education to obtain jobs outside of the combat forces. Many men just wanted the trill of combat, which is still something I will never really understand. The movies also show the paradox that many men were fighting for a country that didn’t really care about them due their economic situations and upbringing.

Although I learned more from Platoon, for me, Full Metal Jacket was an easier watch. While the plot line was darker and there was an added element of suicide, it didn’t creep me out as much as Platoon did. Something about the jungle just got to me. I also couldn’t handle the interaction between U.S. troops and the Vietnamese people. It just made me very sad that situations like that probably really did occur. As the troops lead away their prisoners of war from the village I remember thinking “the Vietnamese people didn’t even want us there.” It was just sad, and I guess that was the main emotion that movies brought out in me while I watched them. I felt a sadness for both American troops and the Vietnamese people alike. They were both just trying to do what the felt was right and I guess that’s what makes War so complicated. Both sides usually have valid reasons for their cause. At then end of the day there is no clearer winner of a war- both sides have lost many troops, time, and resources. I think both movies can be summed up by a quote from Platoon, “Someone once wrote, ‘Hell is the impossibility of reason." That's what this place feels like. Hell.” Vietnam was hell for all involved.