BEST PICTURE SHOWCASE: "Platoon" (1986)

Oliver Stone is considered one of the great writers/directors of this generation by many.  He's vilified by many others.  What makes him so polarizing isn't really something that can be explained in a few sentences, but he's always been quite politically-opinionated, and sometimes his opinions aren't what the majority agree with.  For instance, he was a friend and supporter of the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez.  He also supports Wikileaks founder Julian Assange and Wikileaks contributor Bradley/Chelsea Manning.  His films have pulled no punches in such settings and situations as Turkish prisons (Midnight Express), Presidential assassinations (JFK), musical icons (The Doors) and the war in Vietnam, which he personally knew about as Stone was a combat-experienced Vietnam vet himself.  Stone actually wrote and/or directed three films about Vietnam, and the first of those was today's blog subject, Platoon.  This would be the first time a film about Vietnam was written or directed by an actual veteran of that war, and Stone based several plot details on personal experience.  His initial screenplay was actually written way back in 1968 and sat on the proverbial back burner for many years, getting modified here and there along the way by Stone, but he pretty much gave up on this ever getting made when multiple 1970's films about Vietnam such as Apocalypse Now were huge critical and commercial successes.  Finally in the 1980's, a British producer fell in love with this and another Stone vehicle, Salvador, and offered for his production company to finance both.  The seeds were sown for what would wind up 1986's Best Picture.

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As you can see above, we're in Vietnam at the time and place above with Bravo Company.  We meet Chris Taylor (Charlie Sheen), a college dropout who decided to become a third-generation war vet by serving in Vietnam.  It only takes a week for him to regret that decision, as he explains in a narrative voice-over.  The conditions are brutal.  Thick jungle, fire ants and oppressive heat make his initial excitement dissipate.  His Staff Sergeant is Barnes (Tom Berenger), who gives the orders one night for ambush detail.  Sergeant Elias (Willem Dafoe) tells Barnes in private that those orders should be coming from him, and that sets up what will be a continuous conflict between the two.

Taylor finishes his late-night shift in a driving rain and wakes up Junior (Reggie Johnson) since it's his turn.  Taylor then falls asleep.  Unfortunately, so does Junior.  Taylor is startled awake at about 2:30AM.  The rain's stopped but Taylor can feel something isn't right.  He covers his head with a hoodie and peeks out every few seconds.  He can see someone's jungle-camouflaged shadow leading members of the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) towards them.  A brief firefight ensues.  One American soldier is killed while another is seriously wounded by a grenade weakly thrown by the cowardly Sergeant O'Neill (John C. McGinley).  Taylor is lightly wounded but talks like he's dying.  When the NVA-ers retreat, Barnes and Junior claim that it was Taylor's shift.  Elias tells everyone to knock it off.

After a short stay in the hospital, Taylor returns to his platoon.  He buddies up with several people in the unit who like to smoke marijuana and party at night.  This group includes Elias among others such as King (Keith David), Big Harold (Forest Whitaker) and Francis (Corey Glover).  Those who aren't partying here are playing cards and drinking elsewhere.  This group includes Barnes with others such as O'Neill, Junior and Bunny (Kevin Dillon).  Lt. Wolfe (Mark Moses), who is the platoon commander, doesn't partake in any of the raucousness in either place.  O'Neill thinks Wolfe won't make it through this war.  Barnes says nothing.

It's now January 1, 1968.  Just another day, according to Taylor's narration.  While patrolling, the platoon comes across a bunker complex.  Elias goes underground to investigate it.  Everyone can see people were here recently because the teapot is still boiling.  Two soldiers find maps in a metal box and attempt to pick it up, but it's a booby trap that kills them both.  A third soldier is found mutilated outside.  The platoon is angry now and come across a village nearby which has a large weapons cache.  The soldiers rough up the villagers a bit in trying to get information.  Taylor finds a disabled young male hiding and goes nuts on him for a minute until realizing how horrible he feels about doing it.  This doesn't stop Bunny from bludgeoning the male to death, to the horror of Taylor and O'Neill.  The latter just wants them to leave the hut.  Outside, Barnes interrogates the village chief, using Lerner (Johnny Depp) as a translator.  The chief says the NVA forced the stockpile to be buried there but they haven't been seen in months.  Barnes doesn't accept this explanation and when the chief's wife protests his treatment, Barnes shoots her dead, which makes all the other soldiers look away stunned.  Barnes then threatens the chief's young daughter until Elias arrives and gets into a fistfight with Barnes.  Wolfe orders everyone to leave.  As they do so, Taylor comes across Bunny and several others raping a young village girl.  Taylor puts a stop to that and calls them all animals.

Back at base, Captain Harris (Dale Dye) warns that if what he's heard about American soldiers killing Vietnamese citizens are true, court-martials will be ordered.  This concerns Barnes as Elias seems willing to testify against him.  The platoon is split with Barnes and his guys versus Elias and his guys.  Elias confides to Taylor that they're losing the war in Vietnam, but with America having kicked ass for so long, maybe it's time for America to get theirs kicked.

On the next patrol, the NVA ambushes the platoon, surrounding them.  Lerner and others are wounded.  Wolfe calls the incorrect coordinates in to base and a mortar strike kills several others.  After returning to the helicopter landing area, Elias takes Taylor and others back into the jungle to intercept flanking NVA-ers.  Once the copters arrive, Barnes orders everyone else to retreat while he goes into the jungle to get Elias and the others.  He finds everyone except Elias at first and sends them to the copter.  When he later finds Elias, who is happy to see that its Barnes and not the NVA who found him, Barnes shoots him three times and then goes to the landing area, telling the others that Elias was killed by the enemy.  As the copters take off, Elias emerges from the jungle, running away from many NVA soldiers.  Elias is killed, and Taylor stares at Barnes, who stares back nervously for just a moment before looking away.

Back at base, Taylor tries to recruit the rest of the platoon into retaliating against Barnes.  Barnes walks in and taunts them all.  Taylor and Barnes wind up fighting and Barnes threatens to cut his throat with a knife but is talked out of it.  He just nicks his cheek instead, and then tells everyone they don't know about death.

The platoon returns to yesterday's combat area for defensive positioning.  During this, King gets word his tenure has ended and he's returning home.  King and Taylor say their goodbyes, and Francis replaces him in the foxhole with Taylor.  O'Neill goes to Barnes and says he'd love to get on that helicopter as well but Barnes rebuffs him.  O'Neill gets scared, saying he has a really bad feeling about today.  Barnes still doesn't care.  That night, NVA soldiers attack, and there are heavy casualties.  Bunny, Junior and Wolfe all are killed.  O'Neill hides under a dead Vietnamese soldier to save himself instead of fight back.  The American HQ set up in the area is blown away by a suicide bomber.  Captain Harris orders that this perimeter get Napalmed.  Meanwhile, Taylor and Barnes meet up in the mayhem and Barnes attacks Taylor, about to kill him when an air strikes renders them both unconscious.

The next morning, Taylor awakens and finds an enemy assault rifle.  He then finds the injured Barnes, who dares Taylor to shoot him.  Taylor stares with anger and Barnes starts to mock him, saying he knew Taylor didn't have it in him.  Barnes' last look of shock as Taylor shoots him is priceless.

Francis and Taylor are heading home, having been twice wounded in the war.  (Francis actually wounded himself deliberately so he COULD be sent home.)  O'Neill is summoned by Captain Harris, and O'Neill excitedly responds, thinking he's being sent home as well.  In actuality, Harris assigns him as the new platoon commander.  Taylor's helicopter flies away and he stares down at craters below filled with dead bodies, American and Vietnamese alike.  Taylor sobs as his final narration tells us that the enemy was in ourselves.

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Stone sent an early version of the script somewhere in 1970-71 to Jim Morrison, lead singer of the Doors.  Morrison never responded but he had the script within his possessions when he was found dead in a Paris hotel in 1971.....Platoon was shot in 54 days on a $6.5M budget in the Philippines.  The U.S. Department of Defense would not collaborate on the film, so producers worked with the Philippine military instead.....Dale Dye, who portrayed Captain Harris, was a decorated Vietnam veteran who also served here as the film's technical advisor, as well as the cast's "drill sergeant" for a two-week period prior to filming to prepare them all for their roles.....Corey Glover, who played Francis, went on to greater fame as the lead singer of the band Living Colour.....Stone plays an officer in the movie who gets blown away by the suicide bomber during the final battle.....Some actors who lobbied for and/or were offered roles in the film include James Woods, Denzel Washington, Nick Nolte and Val Kilmer.....Film editor Claire Simpson suggested to Stone that the classical piece "Adagio For Strings" be used throughout the film.  Stone later stated he can't imagine the film without that music having been included.....An on-screen epilogue dedicates this film to all who served and all who died in the Vietnam War.

Stone felt in the 1970's that the best films about Vietnam had already been made.  While this type of thing is always subjective, Platoon may have discredited that belief.  Critics loved it, with many such as Vincent Canby of the New York Times saying this may have been the best work ever in any media about Vietnam.  Box office receipts were huge, with a final take of over $138M against the $6.5M budget.  Oliver Stone, without question, fully "arrived" with this movie, and the Academy agreed, feting the film with 8 nominations within 7 categories.  It won 4 Oscars, and I'm quite shocked it didn't win at least two more.  The category of Best Supporting Actor saw both Berenger and Dafoe nominated, and as is what usually happens when one film has two acting nominees within the same category, those votes likely got split and cancelled each other out.  That win went to Michael Caine for Hannah and Her Sisters, one of the better Woody Allen movies in my view.  Allen's Original Screenplay also bested Stone's.  The most surprising loss to me was Best Cinematography where Robert Richardson lost out to Chris Menges for The Mission.  Where Platoon did bring home gold was Best Sound (crew led by John Wilkinson), Best Film Editing (Simpson), Best Director (Stone) and Best Picture.

These 59th Annual Academy Awards remain a bit of a mystery to me.  For whatever reason, I don't see 1986 as a great movie year.  I definitely feel Platoon earned its nomination and its win, but the other Best Picture nominees were Children of a Lesser God, Hannah and Her Sisters, The Mission and A Room With a View.  None of those to me are Best Picture quality.  Other films that got nominated, many for technical awards, include the likes of Poltergeist II: The Other Side, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, Crocodile Dundee, Salvador and The Clan of the Cave Bear.  Top Gun also got nominated, and took home a win for "Take My Breath Away" as Best Original Song (which, with me being a huge fan of the band Berlin, probably would be my favorite single award win of this ceremony), but Top Gun isn't really that great, let's face it.  It's a nice little popcorn flick and a total 1980's Tom Cruise vehicle, but that's it.  Otello?  Pirates?  My Beautiful Laundrette?  Anyone even remember those movies?  Me neither.  Maybe it was a weak year at the movies, but there's no denying that Platoon was a true achievement, and probably the most brutally-honest depiction proving the old adage, "War is Hell."