Platoon

Rating:
Summary: Did I Miss Something?
Review: I don't understand how this film has received so much critical acclaim, making the AFI's 100 Years 100 Movies list. It struck me as a pretty average movie, with little in the way of thought or plot or character. The idea of telling his story partially through letters to his grandmother is about as corny as you could possibly get. To me, the film seemed to have a number of ideas floating about--loss of innocence, loyalty, betrayal, friendship--but never settled on one for a single moment. Instead, it chose to show a bunch of people we don't know or care about in the jungle shooting guns and shouting profanity. The only scenes that really did anything interesting or unconventional were those two or three that used "Adagio for Strings" for the music. Those couple of scenes taken alone could be considered great--the music and the visuals compliment each other perfectly--but the rest of the movie has little to see. In the end credits it said that the film was dedicated to Vietnam veterans. I think they would be ashamed of it.

Rating:
Summary: Most horrible inaccurite portrayal to the Vietnam War
Review: First off, this was the most horrid movie ever seen. I want to say this, I was not in Vietnam, but I know at least 30 people who had served their time in South East Asia to say this: This movie is a huge slap in the face of the brave men and women who spent their time there. The movie itself is the cynnical idea of a person who has obvoisly spent hgis time protesting the war and porlonging the war to the best of his possibility. It portrays soldiers as "baby killers" and pot heads. It is very much so the popular stereo type for depicting soldiers including our men and women serving in uniform, as monsters with no regard for human life. That they are emotionless, trigger happy, non-intellegent inhuman creatures who will kill they see, no matter if they are man woman or child. The big hype of soldiers being protrayed as babykillers didnt really accur until the incedent in Mai Lay. Which was of coarse and isolated incedent for the most part. What Captain Cally and his people did there was evil and hartless, and should have been tried and thus senteced to death. But no true self respecting soldier would ever hjave done such a thing, nor a real man would do that, or a realy soldier for that matter. And this movie puts soldiers in a bad light. When I decided to join the army, alot of people called me a monster, they call me a war lover, and most of all baby kiler. I am only 19 years old, I ahve enlisted into the army a year ago. This movie is a major dscriminations of vets who fought and died and survived every war since the revolution. It brings tears to mny eyes when I see discraseful movies such as these gets so popular that they think that was always true, that ever LRRP, Ranger, Special Forces, Infantry, Seal or Marine was like. This is not true. I hope one day people can see the truth that soldiers are humans. IF you wanna see movies that are accurate and truthful I recommend Band of Brothers, Hamburger Hill, Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam. These people saw hell, they hated it. They were human. They never wanted to kill anybody, and I hope to god I never go into combat, but if my country calls, I will go and fight, because then I will have the right to say war is wrong. Anybody else who says war is wrong, ask them "Have you served in the military?" If they say no, just nod your head and walk away

Rating:
Summary: Complete folly !!!
Review: Excellant film showing the horrors of war and of what war does to man, should be showing in all schools to show the idiocy of Vietnam and to never let it happen again.
Great acting by charlie Sheen, Tom Berenger and Willam Dafoe.
A very good dvd with good extras.
A well done to Oliver Stone.

Rating:
Summary: Brutal
Review: Brutal, it is the only word I can think of to describe Oliver Stone's film Platoon. Platoon explores the effects of the Vietnam War on the soldiers that fought in it and their battles to contain their inner demons and the rage they harbored for the enemy. The tag line for the movie is, "the only casualty of war is innocence," and the film makes good on this tag line. We see young soldiers go from affable, likeable young men upon their arrival to killing machines committing unspeakable atrocities against the Vietnamese.

Platoon is difficult to watch at times, in fact I had to turn my head in several instances of hard to watch violence. As hard as it is to imagine being in the midst of a war, Platoon comes very close to putting us on the front lines with the sights and sounds of the Vietnam War.

If you have a strong stomach and a desire to learn about the brutality of war, I think this film is for you. Otherwise, you might be better off watching a feel good comedy. War is not for everyone and neither is this movie. Regardless, it has earned its place among the best movies of all time for its brutal, realistic portrayal of The Vietnam War.

Rating:
Summary: Beware Mac OS X users!
Review: 5 stars for a FANTASTIC movie, but one star off because it crashes the Mac OS X DVD player, which won't go past the MGM DVD logo opening animation.

Rating:
Summary: DVD review
Review: Platoon (Special Edition) is a satisfying DVD, but barely.

The picture is probably the best feature. It, for the most part is very clean, crisp and clear. The only grain you will see is in some of the dusty sky scenes.

The sound however is mediocre at best. Yes, it's a 5.1 mix but it makes VERY little use of the surrounds which pretty much makes it a 3.1. The special effect sounds, gunfire and explosions are pretty much monoaural and very static and almost muffled. Just not your typcial hi-definiton sound mix. What's strange is that Hamburger Hill which was made just a year later has equisitly better sound all around. In fact, Hamburger Hill has said to have had the most realistic Vietnam sounds effects ever.

The extras on this disc though are pretty good. The "Tour of the Inferno" documentary was very interesting and really dove deep into Oliver Stone's vision and experiences while filming the picture in the Phillipines during the Ferdinand coup in 1985. I haven't gotten a chance to watch it with the commentaries yet, but I'm sure they're interesting, especially Captain Dale Dye's commentary.

The movie in itself, was a great movie for its time, but I think it may have been surpassed with newer films. Even Apocaclyspe Now Redux is really impressive on DVD. I'm also waiting for "We Were Soldiers" to come out.

Rating:
Summary: One of the all-time great war movies
Review: Platoon deserves to be mentioned alongside 'Saving Private Ryan', 'Black Hawk Down', 'Full Metal Jacket' etc as one of the all-time great war movies. Battle sequences that rival recent productions, this anti-war movie pulled no punches when it was released many years ago. It made me sit up, and it was like watching the first Star Wars movie, only this was of the war genre. Gritty acting, realistic action scenes, powerful message. Highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: One of the best war movies ever made
Review: Platoon is haunting in it's depiction of men hardened by the brutality of combat. Tom Berenger as Sgt. Barnes is unforgettable in his portrayal of a brutal man ultimately adapted to an environment that requires brutality. His character is the one that is most memorable but Willem Dafoe and Charlie Sheen are excellent in their respective roles as well as are many other supporting actors. The tension builds relentlessly as Barnes and Elias are on a collision course from the start and the "real" enemy begins to close in. Along the way there are many gripping sequences depicting both combat and the interval between engagements.
The portrayal of a MY LAI type incident in a Vietnamese village is chilling because it is so easy to see how such a thing can occur when conditions such as these men find themselves in exist.
Charlie Sheen does a great job moving from the "new meat" rookie soldier to the hardnosed veteran he becomes by the end of the film. His progression into a kind of hellish existence does much to explain the behavior of the other Vets earlier in the film.
There are many memorable lines delivered in 60's grunt-speak with conviction by numerous other characters. The dialogue is based on Michael Herr's fine book Dispatches.It is well written and realistic. You can get lost in this film and forget these guys are acting.

Rating:
Summary: When a soldier makes it home...
Review: An exceptional movie, which fully captures the human side of one of the most futile wars in history. The worst war? No. That was WWI, in which the British lost as many men on the first day of the Battle of the Somme as the US lost in ten years in Nam.

Platoon takes you under the hood of the War Machine, and shows through the lives of a diverse group of individuals how wave after wave of raw recruits were shipped out to fight a ruthless, highly-trained, well-eqipped (thanks to the Russians and Chinese) and most of all, motivated Enemy, who were fighting to get their country back. The sad truth is that most of the US soldiers were just fighting to stay alive.

The quality of the cast and direction speaks for itself, and the level of realism is very high, especially in scenes such as the night ambush, where our boy is straining to see the VC through the relentless rain, to decide whether to detonate the Claymores.

Charlie Sheen's acting was simply first class, and his fresh-faced youth drove home the fact that the average age of the combat soldier in Nam was 19. In WWII, it was 26.

More than anything, Platoon illustrates the cost, in human terms, of entering a grinding, sausage machine of a war with no win situation on the horizon. The US did not commit concentrated strategic air power until December, 1972, with the Linebacker II campaign, after which the North began to take the idea of negotiations a little more seriously. When you hold back your most potent weapon for almost ten years, your young men pay the price.

Whatever the armchair critics may say about Platoon, it remains one of the best war movies ever made, and a tribute to the courage of the men and women (like Margarethe Cammermeyer) who served their country in a war that simply made no sense at any level. Above all, it is a tribute to the memory of the 57,000 who never made it home.

Rating:
Summary: Overrated
Review: Oliver Stone's PLATOON is, quite frankly, only so-so. The acting was nothing to get excited over, save for Willem Dafoe (maybe). But then again, with characters that simplistic and underdeveloped, the actors didn't have much to work with. For example, Charlie Sheen's character Chris states that he dropped out of college and enlisted because he felt it unjust that only the poor were forced to fight. That's it. No development, no further reinforcement or motivation, no illustration of how he was raised in a moral family. The viewer is just to take his word. I'm sorry, but flat characters with underdeveloped motivations are a sign of a poor script. (Oh, for those of you used to Oliver Stone movies, let me hold your hand: poor script=poor movie).

Moreover, the contrast between the "good" sergeant and the "bad" sergeant are childishly simplistic--hell, Stone should have given Dafoe a white hat and Berenger a black one and spared us the hackneyed dialogue. The musical score is too melodramatic, and he depicts the Vietnamese as, for the most part, faceless killers. In short, Stone's PLATOON is insultingly manipulative in a cheap, didactic way. Wait a minute, that sounds like EVERY Stone movie.

Two redeeming qualities: the "do the village" scene is quite good, simply because its the only well-executed psychological examination of the soldiers and it more even-handedly portrays the Vietnamese; also, Stone does an excellent job portraying life as a grunt. Any vets out there, I thank you. Sure, there are a lot of explosions and intense fighting scenes, but that does not make a good movie, let alone a good war film. Come on people, use your minds critically. If you're looking for good war flicks, check out PATTON and APOCALYPSE NOW instead. They're intelligent, honest, and original.