Full Metal Jacket Film Analysis
Ironically it was Cimino who reminded Stone of nothing he experienced in Vietnam, and talked him into resurrecting “Platoon”. Stone portrays the war as more of a conflict between American soldiers internally rather than a conflict with the Vietcong. Platoon tells the story of Vietnam from the point of view of a naïve young soldier. The first thing he sees when arriving is rows of bodies being readied to be ship back to the United States. He finds out that other soldiers don’t associate with the new guys because they haven’t put in their time. As the new recruit gains experience in Vietnam, he realizes that war is not only regulated to fighting the known enemy, the NVA/Vietcong, but his fellow comrades as well. Throughout the film you see the
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physical and mental changes of all the soldiers with in the Platoon go through.
Not even a year later after Platoon (1986) was created the film Full Metal Jacket (1987), directed by Stanley Kubrick, was brought to the big screen.
The movie begins in basic training, where Kubrick gives the audience a taste of how basic training process was used to dehumanize the young recruits and shape them into the killers that was stereotypically created by such process. The first half of the film follows one recruit (Private Joker) and the witnessing of the mental self-destruction of another recruit, who in the closing scenes of boot camp kills his drill instructor. In the second half of the film it follows Private Joker in Vietnam as a war correspondent for the military. He would witness prostitution, friends dying, and realize they were fighting an enemy made up of women and children. Stanley Kubrick was a filmmaker who refused to comment on the meaning of his films, because he never wanted to presume to offer the audience the “right’ answers. By offering the “right” answer, audiences would avoid the emotional and intellectual struggle that the film demands. It can be argued though that it attempts to show the vile irony between the desire for combat and the true horrors of war, while suggesting that America is no longer the innocent and upstanding country that it claims to be. Much like Platoon, it’s seen to attack both the mission itself and America’s military authorities in the Vietnam
War.
When it came to the production of war films, the government had a tremendous impact on what the filmmakers had access too. The Department of Defense understands the importance of “information warfare” and maintains a public affairs office in Los Angeles to provide acceptable assistance. Schofield of the Miami Herald would not that since 1911 the Pentagon has given and it has withheld money, depending on how favorably the movie will portray the American military. Which can help films save enormous sums of money, by not having to lease or buy military equipment. For the film The Longest Day, The Department of Defense fully backed up the film, as did the governments of Germany, France and Britain. In order to obtain the services of the other European countries in the film, Zanuck promised to use directors and stars from each of their respective countries to film their portion of history. For the film The Green Berets John Wayne went to President Lyndon B. Johnson and requested cooperation from the U.S. Army for his film, which would be in total support of the war. The previous special assistant to both Presidents JFK and LBJ, and at the time head of Motion Picture Association of America Jack Valenti told President Johnson, “Wanyes politics [were] wrong, but insofar as Vietnam is concerned, his views are right. If he made the picture he would be saying things we want said.” Johnson having just increasing the troop levels in Vietnam, acted on Valenti’s advising and allowed Wayne complete access to the U.S. Army and Valenti granted The Green Berets an unbelievable “G” rating. Allowing the public to see the war as one that was justified and one of importance. The Green Berets would be the only war film about Vietnam that had received full assistance from the Pentagon. As for films like Platoon and Full Metal Jacket, which were considered to be very realistic from a narrative standpoint, their equipment was not. Though for ten years after the war the Pentagon had been warehousing Vietnam-era military hardware but it was not about to lend it to Kubrick or Stone who portrayed the war absurd if not tragic.
physical and mental changes of all the soldiers with in the Platoon go through.
Not even a year later after Platoon (1986) was created the film Full Metal Jacket (1987), directed by Stanley Kubrick, was brought to the big screen.
The movie begins in basic training, where Kubrick gives the audience a taste of how basic training process was used to dehumanize the young recruits and shape them into the killers that was stereotypically created by such process. The first half of the film follows one recruit (Private Joker) and the witnessing of the mental self-destruction of another recruit, who in the closing scenes of boot camp kills his drill instructor. In the second half of the film it follows Private Joker in Vietnam as a war correspondent for the military. He would witness prostitution, friends dying, and realize they were fighting an enemy made up of women and children. Stanley Kubrick was a filmmaker who refused to comment on the meaning of his films, because he never wanted to presume to offer the audience the “right’ answers. By offering the “right” answer, audiences would avoid the emotional and intellectual struggle that the film demands. It can be argued though that it attempts to show the vile irony between the desire for combat and the true horrors of war, while suggesting that America is no longer the innocent and upstanding country that it claims to be. Much like Platoon, it’s seen to attack both the mission itself and America’s military authorities in the Vietnam
War.
When it came to the production of war films, the government had a tremendous impact on what the filmmakers had access too. The Department of Defense understands the importance of “information warfare” and maintains a public affairs office in Los Angeles to provide acceptable assistance. Schofield of the Miami Herald would not that since 1911 the Pentagon has given and it has withheld money, depending on how favorably the movie will portray the American military. Which can help films save enormous sums of money, by not having to lease or buy military equipment. For the film The Longest Day, The Department of Defense fully backed up the film, as did the governments of Germany, France and Britain. In order to obtain the services of the other European countries in the film, Zanuck promised to use directors and stars from each of their respective countries to film their portion of history. For the film The Green Berets John Wayne went to President Lyndon B. Johnson and requested cooperation from the U.S. Army for his film, which would be in total support of the war. The previous special assistant to both Presidents JFK and LBJ, and at the time head of Motion Picture Association of America Jack Valenti told President Johnson, “Wanyes politics [were] wrong, but insofar as Vietnam is concerned, his views are right. If he made the picture he would be saying things we want said.” Johnson having just increasing the troop levels in Vietnam, acted on Valenti’s advising and allowed Wayne complete access to the U.S. Army and Valenti granted The Green Berets an unbelievable “G” rating. Allowing the public to see the war as one that was justified and one of importance. The Green Berets would be the only war film about Vietnam that had received full assistance from the Pentagon. As for films like Platoon and Full Metal Jacket, which were considered to be very realistic from a narrative standpoint, their equipment was not. Though for ten years after the war the Pentagon had been warehousing Vietnam-era military hardware but it was not about to lend it to Kubrick or Stone who portrayed the war absurd if not tragic.