Post 6 S.R.

The first part of the movie "Full Metal Jacket" stages at the marine training camp on Parris Island. From the very beginning the soon to be marine soldiers are stripped from their man-hood by first shaving their heads, creating a image that everyone is the same and will be treated the same. Their Sargeant Hartmen verbally abuses them by saying harsh comments to put them and their self- esteem lower than low. He also physically abuses some of them while they have to stand there and take it. He does this to toughen them up for the things they will have to experience in their near future. They are almost treated as if they were robots and are told to kill and that is their number one goal. Every morning they are expected to wake up early and complete all the task that they are given. This creates them to be more dicipline and structural, something they are going to have to be in the field. When Pyle cant complete all the task the Sargeant punishes the whole group for the wrongs that Pyle commits. This gets too overwhelming for the rest of the Soldiers so they beat Pyle with bars of soap in the middle of the night. This one event causes Pyle to gain more of a focus that gets him better at the drills, but he distance himself socially from the other soldiers. He soon becomes crazy and shoots the sargeant as well as commiting suicide. This foreshadows the future horrors the soldiers will go through when they actually go to war.

The second part of the movie was about Joker and him being a a journalist in the war. His job was to write about being on the frontline on the war and what the experience was during these times for the newspaper "Stars and Stripes". For most of the time Joker and other soldiers spend most of their time picking up Vietnanamese prostitutes. Even though much is not going on in the war, the head editor makes the writers beef of their stories to please the Americans back home. This shows how much control the American Government has during the war. During this time Joker reunites with his old friend cowboy and meets with the rest of the soldiers he will be traveling and fighting with for the rest of the movie.

The third part of the movie is when Joker and the rest of the soldier are about to experience the real thing. War at its worst. They are sent on a mission and Cowboy is made leader of the crew. Accidently one of the Soldiers leads the crew the wrong way and into a deadly situation. While the African American soldier checks to see if its okay to pass by the current location they are in, he is shot by a sniper several times. One of the soldiers try to save him but then is soon killed. As the rest of the soldiers try to go kill the sniper their leader Cowboy is shot in the chest unexpectedly. When Joker and the rest of the soldiers finally find the sniper they shoot her down. Joker is then faced with a decision to "waste" the Vietnam girl or let her suffer in her own blood. He chooses to kill her.

At the end of the movie the soldiers are singing the mickey mouse song because it brings them to a feeling of hope and happiness. They have lost important people to them and still have the rest of their journey to go. Singing this song allows them to get their mind off of war and all the pain it brings for the moment. It is ironic they are singing this song because they are shot in the dark and right after there experience with the sniper.