Title/Year: Platoon, 1986
Director/Birth Country/Year Born: Oliver Stone, USA, 1946
Budget: $6 mil
Gross: $137,963,328 mil
Synopsis: Charlie sheen leads an all star cast in this film about friendship and brotherhood, and the way it evolves though dire circumstance. When men who hate each other are forced to share a foxhole, relationships change, sometimes for the better or the worse.
Narrative/Visual keywords:Friendship, Infantry, Questioning patriotism, Burning villages, rape, murder.
Main character/Arc: Charlie Sheen portrays Chris, who drops out of college to pursue a career in the Vietnam infantry. His pursuit of the glory that comes with war, is unlike the glory that came for his grandfather in WWI and his father in WWII. At the start of the conflict Chris, is scared to pull the trigger, but by the end he is a stone cold killer.
Political/Social Commentary: The film was not a generalization of the Vietnam experience, but a rather an extremely personal view into one particular platoon. If some people fail to see that, there would be a very dangerous generalization painted about all soldiers that served in that conflict. The substance abuse to the literal raping and pillaging of poor Vietnamese villages, were some things this platoon went through making this film more relate able to some than others.
Camera/Lighting Techniques: Different points in the film were shot very differently. Getting to know the characters was an important part in this film, and they all had ample face time. Especially Chris, who always had a very deep focus on his face. When the soldiers were hiking through the jungle, lots of tracking shots were used with trees and brush dominating the foreground. The action sequences were cut together appropriately, fast paced with a multitude of angles.
Historical recognition/relevance: Won Oscars for best directing (Oliver Stone), editing, picture and sound. Won golden globes for best director and best supporting actor (Tom Berringer)
Notable collaboration: Tom Berringer and Charlie Sheen also starred together in the comedy classic Major League
Kevin's review: I found this film more "in your face" than any of the other war films I've screened this term. Oliver Stone no doubt had his own personal experience in Vietnam, and he did an amazing job of showing the horrors of war on a truly personal level. The characters were extremely well developed, and the range of personalities in the platoon were shown by there interactions with each other and their environment. The characters in the film are the most important aspect because of the structure of the film. The film is essentially plot less. There is no real goal or objective for the protagonist. The viewer doesn't really know which direction the platoon is headed and why they are headed in that direction. The enemy is never really visible. The film is a chilling reminder of the general confusion and disorientation of the average soldier in the war.
Firefights would break out of nowhere, killing off characters in the blink of an eye. Boredom and discomfort turns to terror, back to discomfort. The unknown lurking in the jungle made the film as intense as a war film gets.
Firefights would break out of nowhere, killing off characters in the blink of an eye. Boredom and discomfort turns to terror, back to discomfort. The unknown lurking in the jungle made the film as intense as a war film gets.
I like how you write that the film is "plotless." This helps the validity of the film in the sense that there was no clear goal for American soldiers being in Vietnam in the first place, even though the soldiers have their differing opinions on their own roles and purpose being in a foreign country, supposedly spreading democracy and weeding out the enemies.
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