Movie Review: Platoon (1986)

An intense front-line view of a most muddled conflict, Platoon is a close-up examination of the human damage caused by war, and also one of the best war movies ever made. Director Oliver Stone wrote the story based on his personal experiences in Vietnam, and his narrative is unblinking in its portrayal of all that is wrong with war, from politicians sacrificing the lower classes to the resultant irreparable emotional devastation of those who do the killing.

Chris Taylor (Charlie Sheen) is a college student who has willingly enlisted in the army, and he arrives for combat duty in Vietnam of 1967. Oppressive heat, low morale, disgruntled troops, ineffective jungle patrols and clueless commanders are just some of the challenges that he immediately faces, and this is before any enemy encounters.

Chris learns that two fearless sergeants are the de facto leaders of his Bravo Company: Sergeant Elias (Willem Dafoe) stands up for his men and encourages a loose attitude and plenty of camaraderie. Sergeant Barnes (Tom Berenger) is all intensity, having long since adopted a kill'em all individualistic attitude. The men of Bravo Company are divided, with some supporting Elias and others idolizing Barnes. Elias and Barnes are on an inevitable collision course, and after Barnes loses all discipline during a raid on a Vietnamese village, they become mortal enemies.

Chris witnesses the intensifying conflict between the men and survives skirmishes of ever increasing ferocity with the North Vietnamese Army, culminating in a massive gory and desperate battle, during which Chris has to apply all that he has learned from both Elias and Barnes just to try and live for another day.

Stone enriches Platoon by not glossing over the little details that dominate a soldier's experience: the insatiable bugs feeding on human flesh; the endless marching in the impenetrable jungle; digging trenches in the energy-sapping heat; the devastating fatigue causing soldiers to fall asleep at critical moments; and the endless, tense waiting for encounters with the enemy.

And when these enemy encounters do occur, Stone, cinematographer Robert Richardson, and editor Claire Simpson emphasize the overwhelming chaos and confusion. Platoon's battle scenes play out in limited light, the enemy mostly seen as shadows, tactics and strategies utterly lost in the anarchy of the battlefield.

The central theme of Platoon is the contrast in the education of Chris at the hands of Elias and Barnes. Both are exceptional warriors, but while Elias has retained his humanity and is still killing for a greater purpose, Barnes has adopted killing for the sake of killing and no longer cares to delve into the subtleties of when should the killing be justified.

Both men have their followers, and Platoon poses the question as to which form of soldier is needed to win a war. At the personal level, Stone ends the film with Chris standing at the most important fork in his life, having absorbed and internalized characteristics from both Elias and Barnes. Whether he becomes more like Elias or more like Barnes will determine which part of Chris will die, and when.

Tom Berenger and Willem Dafoe lead the testosterone drenched cast, both diving into their roles as jungle combatants with stone-faced relish. Charlie Sheen, with a successful future career still in his hands should he choose not to snort it, finds the balance between the bewilderment of the new recruit thrown into battle and the grim determination of a smart soldier willing to learn and survive. A large supporting cast of at-the-time relative unknowns includes the likes of Forest Whitaker, Johnny Depp and Kevin Dillon.

Platoon condemns war by staring at its horror, a reminder that while the dead represent the tragedy, the survivors and those who do the killing are plunged into the same universe of infernal misery.

All Ace Black Blog Movie Reviews are here.

Movie Review: JFK (1991)

A brilliant movie, and a dangerous one.

After watching JFK, it is difficult to believe that anything other than an elaborate conspiracy was responsible for the 1963 assassination of US President John F. Kennedy in Dallas. Director Oliver Stone weaves together a narrative that is fictional yet so compelling, incriminating the military-industrial complex, the mafia, the Cubans, the Dallas police and Mayor's office, all the way up to Vice President Lyndon Johnson, with alleged trigger man Lee Harvey Oswald (Gary Oldman) playing nothing but the patsy, as he always claimed. Only the President himself, it seems, was unaware that the President was about to be assassinated.

And this is where Stone's case really crumbles like an elaborate castle built on air. His conspiracy theory ends up pointing the finger at hundreds of people, in a classic throw-all-the-mud-at-the-wall-and-see-what-sticks approach. Not only would such a plot be much more incredible than the lone gunman story, on closer examination, most of the case that Stone builds is based on half-truths that are stretched several degrees past reality.

It takes some time, but it is worthwhile to go through the patient debunking of most of Stone's thesis, for example as presented on the website One Hundred Errors of Fact and Judgment in Oliver Stone's JFK. Only then does it become clear how dangerous a movie can be in influencing opinion by just slightly twisting or expanding every factoid.

Setting that aside, JFK is marvelous entertainment. More than three hours zip by as Stone uses dazzling cinematic techniques, combining menacing documentary style back and white scenes with a vivid recreation of the entire assassination in Dealey Plaza, interspersed with the re-imagining of Oswald's story and that of the myriad of shady yet colourful characters implicated in the mind of the conspiracy theorists.

The focus of Stone's narrative is New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison (Kevin Costner). Three years after the assassination, Garrison opens an investigation into Oswald's activities in New Orleans. Garrison is quickly engrossed in the assassination case to the point of obsession, and gathers a team of investigators to track down all leads related to Oswald. As Garrison's family life starts to suffer and his wife (Sissy Spacek) is ignored, Oswald's acquaintances in and around New Orleans come to life through the investigation, including mysterious characters like bushy-eyebrowed David Ferrie (Joe Pesci), gay and rich Clay Shaw (Tommy Lee Jones), g-man Guy Banister (Edward Asner), sleazy lawyer Dean Andrews Jr. (John Candy) and the criminal Willie O'Keefe (Kevin Bacon). They are all presented as somehow related and working either openly or secretly for various government departments not happy with Kennedy's policies.

Garrison is helped by a deep-throat type source presented only as X (Donald Sutherland), a Washington DC-based colonel in the US Air Force with his own strong doubts about the lone gunman theory.

The performances from the star-sprinkled cast are excellent, with Costner doggedly determined as Garrison. The recognizable faces in every role add to the quality and entertainment value, and even the odd couple of Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon have small roles, although never on-screen together.

Garrison eventually hauls Shaw into court on charges of participating in the conspiracy to assassinate the President. Although there is very little evidence tying Shaw to anything, Garrison uses the courtroom as a megaphone to present an elaborate, grand conspiracy theory. Shaw is acquitted, and Garrison is humiliated, other than in the eyes of those who see conspiracy where incompetence is much more evident. The real conspiracy that needs to be investigated is how Stone managed to turn myths and half-truths into such a captivatingly terrific film.

All Ace Black Blog Movie Reviews are here.