Blog 6 DW

The first part of the movie takes place at boot camp on Parris Island. The soldiers are being trained to go to Vietnam by going through intense physical conditioning as well as other things that will help get them accustomed to military life. When they first get there, they are made to look identical to one-another. Their heads are shaved and they are all given the same uniforms and taught to march in unison. They lose their personal identity and become just a part of the Marines; one of many. The main character, Joker, is ordered to help a struggling soldier named Pyle. The other soldiers in the platoon become frustrated and start resenting Lt. Pyle because he cannot keep up and continues to screw up, which they are punished for. Finally, even Joker gets fed up with Pyle so one night the hold him down and everyone takes turns beating him. This causes Pyle to start talking to his gun and losing his mind, but becoming a better soldier, however, later ends up killing the platoons Sergeant and then himself. This shows that there is a fine line where you have to be on to be a good soldier, but if you go too far, you will end up completely losing your mind and doing something crazy.

The second part of the movie takes place on a supply base in Vietnam with Joker. Joker has been assigned as a Journalist for Stars and Stripes where he and the other journalists chose which stories they want to write about that put a positive spin on the war. Jokers boss explains to the group that they need to report only on the good stuff happening in the war, like a Vietnamese soldier dead or battle won, but not about the bad things like a dead US soldier. This is because there are a lot of reporters that are against the war and if they are the only ones reporting on the war, everyone will soon become anti-war. He is ordered to do an investigative report on a platoon and the war on the front lines. An old friend of his from boot camp named Cowboy is in the platoon and helps accommodate him to the other soldiers and to actually having to fight. This shows the bonds that soldiers develope between each other and that even after so much time has passed, they still feel like brothers.

The final section of the movie is about the actual fighting that Joker has to do with the new platoon. There he experiences things like death and having to kill someone yourself. He is involved in a firefight with the whole platoon and then has to watch cowboy die after being shot by a sniper. He has his eyes opened to the real war by being out there on the front lines. He was used to writing about the positive parts of the war from somewhere he wasn't in danger, but when he personally goes to the front lines and is involved with the fighting, he learns the hard way that the war is full of tragedy and harship. He even has to kill a woman after she is wounded by Rafterman. She is the sniper that killed three of their soldiers and is dying very slowly, begging for death so he takes out his pistol and shoots her. Joker has now become a soldier and a killing machine like they were training him to be in boot camp. In the very last scene, the soldiers are singing the Mickey Mouse song in a very eerie walk in the dark. This represents the transformation of the young boys into soldiers. They are singing a child's song about a cartoon character while they are in a war zone looking for the enemy so they can kill them.

Together, these different parts of the movie depict what the lives of the soldiers are like from the very beginning. It starts with the boot camp of the soldiers and follows them through the different stages of their tour in the war. It shows the development of the young soldiers as they move through the different stages from innocent young men into "killing machines" developed by the military. We get a brief view into the struggles and experiences that the common soldier would have to endure.