Full Metal Jacket
You know, there are some really good Vietnam War movies. The Deer Hunter (directed by Michael Cimino) won the 1978 Academy Award for Best Picture and introduced Meryl Streep and Christopher Walken to stardom. A year later, Francis Ford Coppola's troubled Apocalypse Now revealed the madness of the war in Vietnam. Oliver Stone's masterpiece Platoon won the 1986 Academy Award for Best Picture, and its 1989 "sequel," Born on the Fourth of July, brilliantly shows a Marine's struggles to re-enter American society after becoming a paraplegic. Lastly, even the late Stanley Kubrick wanted to hop on the Vietnam War bandwagon. He did so with FMJ and directed this war drama with ironic humor and masterful execution.
Most people see this movie as having two distinct parts. The first section deals with Marine Corps training at the hands of hard-ass drill instructor Hartmann (R. Lee Ermey, who was a real-life drill instructor). Training scenes center on the tense battle of wills between Hartmann and the corps' most incompetent trainee, Private Leonard Lawrence (a.k.a. Private Pyle). Part two takes place during battle from the perspective of Private Joker, one of Hartmann's soldiers who became a field correspondent for the war.
Consistent with most of Kubrick's films, FMJ deals with the theme of dehumanization. Hartmann wants his group of "maggots" to be more than human and more than Marines; he wanted them to be killers. The drill sergeant stresses the importance of the killer instinct, and that Marines should always keep this instinct sharp. Later scenes show soldiers applying this skill. A helicopter gunner shoots at unarmed civilians for fun. The climatic scene shows a key character losing part (if not all) of his humanity.
Even though war is not a laughing matter, most of the training scenes in FMJ are. For someone who has never experienced training for any of the Armed Forces, the scenes where Hartmann chews out the new recruits are hilarious. Here are some of my favorite quotes during which Hartmann is the speaker:
* "You climb like old people fuck!" (to Private Pyle).
* "A rifle is only a tool. It's a hard heart that kills." (it's not humorous, but it's an interesting point).
* "Pyle, you had best unfuck yourself and start shitting me Tiffany cufflinks or I will definitely fuck you up!"
* "There is no racial bigotry here. I do not look down on niggers, kikes, wops or greasers. Here, you are all equally worthless."
Full Metal Jacket joins the ranks of the aforementioned war films, which all detail the effect that the Vietnam War has on the soldiers. It's a great film to watch with your buddies. If you don't like FMJ at all, I'll rip out your eyeballs and skull-fuck you!
Send any comments/ feedback to the author.
The serious nature of war films may lead you to suck down some brew.
Soldiers bartering with a Vietnamese prostitute over her price and excessive uses of the word "fuck" are the closest that FMJ comes to romance.
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