 A superb ensemble cast falls in for action in Stanley Kubrick's brilliant saga about the Vietnam War and the dehumanizing process that turns people into trained killer. Joker, Animal Mother, Gomer, Eightball, Cowboy and more - all are plunged into a boot-camp hell pitbulled by a leatherlung D.I. Who views the would-be devil dogs as grunts, maggots or something less. The Action is savage, the story unsparing, the dialogue spiked with scathing humor. Full Metal Jacket, from its rigors of basic training to its nightmare of combat in Hue City, scores a cinematic direct hit. Storyline: A two-segment look at the effect of the military mindset and war itself on Vietnam era Marines. The first half follows a group of recruits in boot camp under the command of the punishing Gunnery Sergeant Hartman. The second half shows one of those recruits, Joker, covering the war as a correspondent for Stars and Stripes, focusing on the Tet offensive. Written by Scott Renshaw Reviewer's Note: Reviewed by Martin Liebman on November 9, 2007 -- You're so ugly you could be a modern art masterpiece! --- Ugly? This movie is anything but. Sure, on the surface it's very ugly. The language, the nonstop torturous physical training, and the war can be and often is ugly and disgusting. Stanley Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket is such a beautifully crafted movie, however, that it really is a modern art masterpiece of film. Platoon may have walked away with the Oscars, but Full Metal Jacket is, bar none, the definitive Vietnam War movie. One of the many beautiful things about this movie is that it is more than a Vietnam war movie. Like The Deer Hunter, the first half of the film deals with life away from the war. In the case of The Deer Hunter, a group of friends from Western Pennsylvania experience the fullness of life hunting deer and attending a wedding before heading for the jungles of Vietnam. In Full Metal Jacket, the first shot of the film is of fresh recruits having their heads shaved as they enter boot camp, the first step in dehumanizing them in order to rebuild them from the ground up (or maybe from the head down) to be U.S. Marines. Other films such as Apocalypse Now and Platoon drop the viewer in-country from the get-go. Full Metal Jacket is, on the surface, the story of Private Joker (Matthew Modine), a raw recruit whose journey takes him from boot camp at Parris Island to Hue City in Vietnam as a reporter for Stars and Stripes, and smack-dab in the middle of the Tet Offensive. This was a massive and coordinated North Vietnamese attack on every American installation in the country during the famous Vietnamese holiday that is like "the Fourth of July, Christmas, and New Year all rolled into one." While at Parris Island, Private Joker is introduced to three crucial characters--Private Cowboy (Arliss Howard), Private Pyle (Vincent D'Onforio in one of the most memorable roles in film history), and Gunnery Sergeant Hartman (Lee Ermey, also as one of film's most memorable characters). Private Pyle is an overweight recruit who is finding adapting to the rigors of Marine Corps training painful and near impossible. It's Sgt. Hartman's job to get him into combat shape, and he uses every means at his disposal to accomplish this task including some of the foulest language you will ever hear, physical punishment, and finally blaming the platoon for Pyle's shortcomings. He also turns to Joker to mentor Pyle and attempt the impossible--to turn him into a lean, mean, green killing machine. By the end of boot camp, Pyle is indeed a killing machine, leading to a chilling, all-time classic movie confrontation. Once in Vietnam, Joker and his photographer, Rafterman (Kevyn Major Howard), are sent to the front lines to cover the Tet Offensive and the U.S. counterattack near the Perfume River. It is here that he is reunited with Cowboy and is introduced to his squad mates, EightBall (Dorian Harewood) and Animal Mother (Adam Baldwin). On patrol in the city, the squad ends up lost and comes under fire from a sniper, causing panic and the deaths of several Marines. I have always found the theme of the movie to revolve round Joker's statement regarding the "duality of man." He wears a peace symbol on his body armor while "Born to Kill" is written on his helmet. The entire film is a study in duality. The film is divided into two distinct halves, each its own story including an exposition, a climax, and a dénouement. The characters themselves, especially upon arrival in Vietnam, are almost bipolar; they are trained killers on one hand, but the harshness of boot camp and the war has not completely removed from them their sense of humanity and camaraderie, though we see glimpses of lost sanity including a scene where the corpse of a Vietnamese soldier is the "guest of honor" at a party. Even Animal Mother, the gung-ho, M-60 wielding, shoot anything that moves (or doesn't), vicious killer foregoes his own safety and concern for self above all else that he displayed earlier in the film to rescue fallen Marines who have become victims of the sniper. The score too plays a part in this case study. Upbeat, hip tunes of the 1960s play over the more agreeable and lighter moments in the film, but an industrial sounding, heavy, creepy, metallic sounding score foreshadows scenes of impending peril. The film ends as Marines walk out of the city where they have seen dozens of their friends killed singing the Mickey Mouse Club song, reverting to a childlike sense of indifference or mentally blocking the death and destruction they are leaving behind. This film is a masterpiece on so many levels, everything about it is right. Many Marines have commented that this film, above all others, most accurately represents what life in the Marine Corps and in war is all about. No film could garner higher praise than that. The debate will always rage as to which film is the best of the Vietnam war movies, but my money remains on Full Metal Jacket. Stanley Kubrick's phenomenal direction on top of several unforgettable characters make this a must see and a must own. This Blu-ray release is a remarkable upgrade from any version I have ever seen both visually and sonically. I wish there was more in the way of supplements, but what we get is good. This disc gets my highest recommendation. Cast Notes: Matthew Modine (Pvt. J.T. 'Joker' Davis), Adam Baldwin (Animal Mother), Vincent D'Onofrio (Pvt. Leonard 'Gomer Pyle' Lawrence), R. Lee Ermey (Gny. Sgt. Hartman [as Lee Ermey]), Dorian Harewood (Eightball), Kevyn Major Howard (Rafterman), Arliss Howard (Pvt. Cowboy), Ed O'Ross (Lt. Touchdown), John Terry (Lt. Lockhart), Kieron Jecchinis (Crazy Earl), Kirk Taylor (Payback), Tim Colceri (Doorgunner), Jon Stafford (Doc Jay [as John Stafford]), Bruce Boa (Poge Colonel), Ian Tyler (Lt. Cleves). IMDb Rating (09/11/12): 8.4/10 from 241,798 users Top 250: #80 IMDb Rating (07/19/09): 8.3/10 from 129,444 users Top 250: #92 IMDb Rating (01/20/07): 8.2/10 from 68,679 users Top 250: #93
 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
