Platoon

Platoon_360P

...Platoon is right up your alley. The first 2/3 of this film are rock-solid, but not spectacular. The last 1/3 is cartoonish, silly, weepy, and downright goofy. Someone really needs to rein in Oliver Stone; his films all have some merit, but his frantic attempts to beat his messages into an apparently undemanding audience invariably drive his films into a ditch.

What a lousy, over-hyped movie this is. It was little more than a series of overacted performances exaggerated to the point of being ridiculous. The horror of war was not evident in this movie, only the horror of ham performances. Constant screaming, lots of blood and profanity are no substitute for good acting. Defoe's character is shot twice almost point blank by Berringer and yet he manages to survive and stagger around, one assumes this is Stone's attempt at dragging emotion out of his audience, although the emotion was humor and not sadness. These actors can be grateful that they were so young at the time of the movie and can use that as their excuse.

Platoon is to the Vietnam War as Rocky IV is to heavyweight championship boxing. Oliver Stone's story of the experience of a US Army platoon in Vietnam in 1968 is so overdone it's laughable. While most or all of the occurrences in Platoon did occur over the 10+ year span of US military involvement in Vietnam, to portray these things happening to one small group of men in such a short time frame (weeks) gives a horribly skewed picture of the war. In Platoon, the men of the platoon see all of the following in the course of a week or two: US soldiers murdering civilians, US Soldiers raping civilians, a US Sergeant murdering another US Sergeant, a US Private murdering a US Staff Sergeant, US soldiers killed/wounded by friendly fire, 90%+ killed or wounded in the platoon. For Stone to try to pass this film off as the typical experience of a US soldier in Vietnam is a disgrace. Two Vietnam War films I would recommend are We Were Soldiers (the TRUE story of arguably the worst battle for US soldiers in Vietnam) and HBO's A Bright Shining Lie.

It's September 1967, and Chris (Charlie Sheen) has just arrived in Vietnam. He is sheltered and his father and grandfather fought in the military. As the new guy, nobody cares to be his friend. Lt. Wolfe (Mark Moses) is a weak ineffective leader. His men are divided in two. Some are followers of the cruel Sgt. Barnes (Tom Berenger). Others are followers of the humane Sgt. Elias (Willem Dafoe). In the end, Barnes and Elias are in a struggle for Chris' soul. This is the quintessential Vietnam war movie. Oliver Stone has recreated the jungle combat and placed a morality tale in the middle of it. It is possibly Charlie Sheen's greatest performance. His innocence at the beginning evolves into a grizzled veteran fighter. The combat is so realistic, and the story is so compelling. It is a must see for all movie goers.

"Platoon" was my first introduction to wartime reality.I was just a kid when first viewing it and the film left a powerful impression in me.Before that,I had only seen a couple of Rambo films and thats what I expected to get here,pretty much.It turned out to be something quite different from that,although it would take me a few years to realize just how different. "Platoon" is Oliver Stone's breakthrough picture and a landmark in Hollywood history of the 80's.It features almost every well known actor on the rise from that era,most notable ones being Forest Whitaker,Johnny Depp,Willem Dafoe,Francesco Quinn and Charlie Sheen. Why is it a landmark film?It helped to bring more understanding into the hot issue of Vietnam war,although "Apocalypse Now!" had already worked out that subject in the most stunning way.Yet there was still something left to say for Stone.It was pretty much the same as Coppola said,but in another,more harrowing and less complex way.We got a closer glimpse of how it is to die,for one.Dafoe's heroic end is one of the most dramatic scenes in history of war films. A strong issue here is the abuse of military codes and discipline.Tom Berenger's sadistic,disturbed sgt. Barnes is the perfect example of a warrior playing god,or angel of death, and fighting a war by his own rules.Berenger plays Barnes so well that it really gives you the chills watching him and you want him dead.Sgt. Elias is his counterpart in every way,as he really cares for his men and is in touch with the human in him always. He is not popular among the lowlifes like the redneck psychopath Bunny (great early role by Kevin Dillon) and the spineless racist O'Neill in John McGinley's incarnation. Another spineless character is the young lieutenant,who on one hand is a greater sinner than Barnes.He has no control over the men under his command whatsoever and refuses to take responsibility or even feel the guilt for not doing anything to prevent the massacre of the village committed by Barnes and his butchers.Here we see the effect that the horrors are having on private Chris,as he in a fit of frustration and anger over the situation he is in tortures a sick and frail creature of a man and ends up in tears.Its a powerful and riveting scene which highlights the film's message against war,showing its inhumanity and absurdity in the most shocking way. The final battle is very brutal and well shot.It sums up the whole Vietnam war and the strategy of the American army.The napalm kills not just the Vietcongs but also Americans.Ironically,it saves Chris' life as he is about to be killed by Barnes during their confrontation.Bunny gets what he deserves and Junior,who is the most despicable of the black characters here,also dies.This may be seen as director's own judgment.The only other sympathetic character still alive by this time,the underground lord Rah, is left alive.Francesco Quinn shows here that he is capable of taking over his father's legacy. In the end,this film is not flawless,but it is a perfect document of the madness that occurred in Vietnam 1964-73.And its consistent to its very end,which by the way is very touching and almost made me cry the second time I watched it.It is funny how one can feel both happy and sad about leaving a war torn place.Such are the feelings that a war conjures up in a man.It is almost like Chris was sad he was leaving,or maybe the emotions that were bubbling under surface just came out for real. Any which way,this film will always be remembered as the one that gave a true and unpolished picture of mankind at war at a time when Hollywood producers made an attempt to glorify the US army and cast an eclipse on its disgraceful stain,transforming the killing into culture.Ironically they succeeded.8/10

The Vietnam War has been one of the controversial wars in history and was an unpleasant experience for everyone involved. Oliver Stone harnessed these experiences to make Platoon; a film where he could illustrate to everyone what Vietnam was like from his perspective. In my opinion, this is the best war movie ever made. The sheer horror of war is captured so well in everyway. The fear of death, compatriots dying, divisions in the platoon, guilt of killing; it's all there and Stone doesn't try to disguise it. Platoon is very honestly written and it is this honesty that makes the film so great. Platoon isn't an anti war movie and it certainly does not glorify war in anyway, it is simply how war is in its entirety. There are some shocking scenes such as the one in the Vietnamese village but there are also more light hearted moments such as where the troops on Dafoe's side are partying and having a good time. On base camp, there is great contrast with the mood but on the forest, it is just fear, aggression and blood, nothing else. Taylor's (Charlie Sheen) story is very good as he experiencing war at the same time of the audience. Before the war, he was a rich kid who loved his grandma and it is how war changes him that is truly fascinating. The character story that always receives most praise however is that between Barnes (Tom Berenger) and Elias (Willem Dafoe) is very compelling and leads to some great scenes with them and carves an interesting divide within the camp. This film is big on character and explores many relationships but (take note Jarhead) doesn't sacrifice any action time for these scenes. Stone struck a perfect balance between action and story. Acting from everyone involved is very good. Sheen as the naïve newcomer is very good and after this, should have done much better for himself than he did. Dafoe and Berenger, once again steal the attention off the lead. Their extreme contrasting personalities is brilliantly done and raises the standard of the film. Berenger is truly terrifying, he didn't hold back in this one. Dafoe is much more sympathetic and will speak his mind to anyone. Johnny Depp makes one of his early film appearances with a small, yet memorable role. The way Sheen is wearing Depp's bandana after Lerner (Depp) gets taken by the chopper is discretely done but touching. Platoon is the best war movie there's ever been. Stone wrote and directed this film with such passion that it couldn't be anything but good. A great mix of characters, a great cast and such well crafted action scenes are all what you need for an exceptional war movie and they're all here. The film ends perfectly as we are given a chance to reflect and take it in before the credits start rolling. Stone, who often misses the point with his films, hit the nail on the head with this one.

Platoon left me absolutely numb after watching it. Oliver Stone,(Who in fact did serve in Vietnam) did a fantastic job telling this story of the horrors and the insanity of the Vietnam war. What's to be admired about this film, is that Stone doesn't sweet-talk the story, with the good old American boys fighting for their country and facing brutality, instead he brings up a strong morality and humanity issue. It's wasn't all black and white, it wasn't one person was wrong, one was right, there was all shades of gray in between. He uses the characters of Sergeant Barnes and Sergeant Elias (both played brilliantly) as symbols of good and evil clashing into one another. Charlie Sheen (Chris, the narrator of the story) is in a sense torn between both, they are both a part of him as he tries to deal with things falling apart all around him. Vietnam was a senseless war, and Platoon tries to understand why we went through it and how we ever got through it.

I watched Platoon when I was 17 at 1987. I was on the edge of questioning everything and ready to uprise with a small move. Of course I was fascinated after watching the movie and I remember I was that close to cry. I can definitely say Platoon is one of the best war movies of the history. It has many incredible scenes and it reserves a great story of brotherhood inside also vandalism and senseless of war. Charlie Sheen , William Dafoe and the great Tom Berenger can easily be considered as one the best combination of actors to tell a story of faith and betrayal in a movie. Oliver Stone did a great job as writer and director. I remember that I was really touched with the letters that Taylor ( Charlie Sheen ) writes to his grandma. Also with the amazing music of the film you feel many different things. I believe that on the last scene the picture of William Dafoe with his hands open on his knees with hundreds Viet Congs coming after him is a masterpiece work and unforgettable.I watched this movie at Osmanbey Gazi movie theater at Osmanbey-Istanbul and ı believe 70's and 80's are the best time in Istanbul for watching a movie with big saloons and with great atmosphere. With 90's big movie theaters started to turn to couple of small saloons and with shopping malls movie theaters started to locate at malls. I really miss a lot of 80's and the taste I get from the legend movie theaters like Osmanbey Site-Sisli Kent-Osmanbey Gazi- Pangaltı Inci-Harbiye Konak and Harbiye As.

Platoon is the film that not only put director Oliver Stone well and truly on the Hollywood map, its huge critical and commercial success also would set the Vietnam War film cycle into hyper-drive. It centres on a platoon on a tour of duty in Vietnam through the eyes of a young recruit who quit college to volunteer for active service. It is in essence a combat film where the view is at ground level. In this sense it mixes traditional gun battles with the smaller more personal details that show the discomfort of life in the jungle. Its approach was very realistic for its time and in some ways it did reinvent what a war film could be. While it does have many scenes of combat action, they are pretty messy and unglorified and the film has a pretty clear anti-war message. This is conveyed in quite a major way by how the platoon itself is portrayed. It's divided into two camps led by two diametrically opposite sergeants Barnes and Elias (Tom Berenger and Willem Dafoe, respectively). The former is a facially scarred, violent man, while the latter is a morally sensitive borderline hippy. They show both sides of the American thinking about the war, with Barnes and his alcohol drinking followers the ugly brutal side of the coin and Elias and his marijuana smoking buddies the ones who question the participation of their country. This dramatic tension is brought fully to the fore in the pivotal moment of the film where the platoon commit mass murder and rape in a village, in a nod to arguably the most infamous real event in the war, a massacre at the village of Mai Lai in 1968. The dramatic conflict, while being the real meat of the film, does look quite overly simplistically done to my eyes now, with the evil Barnes and his bevvy merchant bad boys set against the hippy-like Elias and his chilled-out troops. It comes across as too black and white. It gets the message across but it does so with little subtlety or grey areas. I think Platoon overall, has aged a little worse than some of its contemporaries like Apocalypse Now (1979), Full Metal Jacket (1987) or Casualties of War (1989). This is probably a lot to do with Stone's overly politicised message, while the classical music which soundtracks the grimmest moments probably felt original at the time but now almost comes across as, dare I say it, a little cheesy. The film benefits somewhat from having quite a good cast, some of whom are actors who would go onto big careers, although in truth future mega star Johnny Depp makes absolutely no impression whatsoever in his minor role as a translator. All-in-all, Platoon is still an impressive combat film but it's one which for me has not aged too great in other ways. It still has historical importance as a key entry in the sub-genre though.