Realities of War, as told by Hollywood

Full Metal Jacket and Platoon are different though both effectively telling films that provide unique insight in to the Vietnam War.

Full Metal Jacket seemingly gives less focus to the actually battle time itself and more to the initial training of soldiers beforehand. We are able to see how the men grow over the course of their Marine Corps boot camp and gain knowledge of their feelings before being sent off to Vietnam. It was interesting to see how demeaning Sgt. Hartman is and how it psychologically affects each of them differently until his own climactic death. Once over in Vietnam, we are introduced to a new, colorful set of characters that bring a comedic aspect to significantly lighten the mood. Though this slightly distracts from the credibility of the movie as a war portrayal, it keeps things entertaining amongst what would typically be a solemn plot. Joker still plays a key role but I was still curious of the whereabouts of some of the characters introduced in the first half.

Although Stanley Kubrick makes an attempt at character development with several of the soldiers, I found that I followed Charlie Taylor’s journey in Platoon better than those in Full Metal Jacket. The film exposes more realistically horrifying situations in Vietnam, perhaps due to the fact that it’s director, Oliver Stone, is a veteran of the war himself. There are scenes such as the rape and murder of Sgt. Barnes that were questionably gruesome but ultimately, it had greater impact on a viewer like myself who is not as familiar with the true conditions of war. The rugged violence had me squinting my eyes almost every other scene but really educated me on what life was like from a soldier’s perspective during that time.