Blog 6 CG

Stanley Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket is a film that depicts the Vietnam War like no other. Kubrick divides his film up into three parts. The movie starts out with Marine basic training at Parris Island in South Carolina. The movies opening scene is a bunch of fresh-faced teenagers having their heads shaved by the military barbers -- the first of many steps toward breaking down the recruits and building them back up again. Parris Island is depicted as a hellish and grotesquely unforgiving place, where men come to be made into killing machines. We are introduced to Joker, the main character, and Gomer Pyle, a hefty man who can do no right. Gomer ends up taking all the harsh punishment to his head and committing a murder suicide to end the first part. This first part shows us how men are trained to become robots. The repetition of lines like "I am a killing machine" and "This is my rifle. Without me it is useless. Without it I am useless" really gets to the point of the training. Everything humane and socially acceptable is thrown out the window as these young boys are taught to kill.

The second part of the film follows Joker as he works as a combat correspondant. Joker travels through many parts of Vietnam, seeing all that the once beautiful country's conflict has to offer. This lets him see alot of different soldiers takes on the Vietnam War, war in general, and their overall outlooks. Most soldiers seem to have a dark sense of humor. One soldier who Joker ran into dressed up a dead VC and put him in a chair. He claimed the dead man was their "guest of honor". Also, most soldiers didnt care if America should be in the war politically speaking, but they did believe that they should be there killing the Vietnamese. This is the military chain of command controlling the soldiers morality through orders given by superiors. Overall this second part gets highlights the life of a Vietnam soldier when not under fire. Soldiers are cocky, dark, hardass, and manly. Soldiers talk a big game and seem to have no moral fiber. This all changes in the third part.

The third part follows Joker out onto the front lines, where he is in the real bush. Soldiers under fire take on a whole new form. Joker and his squad recieve enemy sniper fire in the most memorable section of this part. 8-Ball is hit with an enemy sniper round, and the medic who goes out to treat him is greeted in the same fashion. After seeing their brothers hit, the squad falls out of formation, ignores command and general strategy, and pretty much goes into chaos. The mixture of brotherhood, sympathy, anger, and fear all add to the chaos. Eventually the men get into the snipers tower and down the markswoman, who is severley injured but not yet dead. Five or six soldiers gathered around her as she suffered and muttered "kill me". When the time comes for the soldiers to actually kill someone who they have to look in the face, they all freeze up. This highlights the difference between faceless killing and personal killing, and the soldiers are hard pressed to commit the latter. This shows killing in a whole new light, and shows that the infantry men are actual humans and not killing machines. The third part shows us why war truly is hell.

These three parts give us a more full experience of the Vietnam War. In the first part, we get to see the brutal beatdown and the emotional breakdown that goes along with basic training. In the second, we see soldiers at ease, confident and full of piss and vinegar. The final part shows us the chaos and fear that go along with being under fire. I think the Mickey Mouse song is a fitting song for the end of the movie because it is a very upbeat and positive song, and I feel like that represents how the surviving soldiers feel to be alive. They consider themselves lucky to be able to march on, so a happy-go-lucky tune is fitting. Also, this song is ironic in the fact that the situation they are in is actually quite terrible. This song provides positive contrast to the negative atmosphere of the war.