PLATOON

Written and directed by Oliver Stone, the film that took home the Oscar for Best Picture in 1987 was Platoon. Set in Vietnam during the Vietnam War, the film is based on Stone’s actual experiences serving in the same war. It’s raw, emotionally draining, and extremely unpleasant. It’s also a damn fine movie.

Charlie Sheen plays the central character of Chris Taylor, a newly arrived infantryman. Unlike the other soldiers around him, he has not been drafted, but instead has volunteered thinking that it is his duty as an American citizen. Upon arriving in Vietnam he quickly learns that the newer you are, the less valuable the rest of the company finds you to be. As the movie’s tagline states, “The first casualty of war is innocence”. The movie does not glorify war, or America’s efforts in them. In fact, it does the opposite by immersing the viewer very quickly into the utter chaos and destruction that war entails. The carnage is high, the mutilation plentiful, and the mental challenges immense. Seeing people placed in inhumane environs, and then watching how that, in turn, sends them down the rabbit hole of seeing other races/people as less human is not enjoyable to watch, but it is sobering.

Sheen’s performance is an accomplished one, but he is outshone by Willem Defoe and Tom Berenger. The two actors portray sergeants within the unit, each with members of the team who look to them for guidance. Defoe and those who follow him seek nothing other than trying to make the best of the undesired circumstances while watching out for one another. Berenger on the other hand is a fully realized creature of war, reveling in it, and using it to excuse otherwise inexcusable behavior. They are very figuratively set out as representing good and evil. Sheen, as Taylor, must continually choose how much of his soul he can afford to sacrifice to simply be lucky enough to come out alive… if he can at all.

An added bonus is seeing so many young actors in the cast who will eventually go on to have very long and successful careers in Hollywood. Among them are Johnny Depp, Forest Whitaker, John C. McGinley, Kevin Dillon, Keith David and Mark Moses.