Platoon (film)

Platoon is a 1986 Vietnam war film written and directed by Oliver Stone and starring Charlie Sheen, Tom Berenger, Willem Dafoe, Forest Whitaker, Kevin Dillon, Keith David, John C. McGinley, and Johnny Depp. It is the first of Stone's Vietnam War trilogy, followed by Born on the Fourth of July (1989) and Heaven & Earth (1993).

The story is drawn from Stone's experiences as a U.S. Infantryman in Vietnam and was written by him upon his return as a counter to the vision of the war portrayed in John Wayne's The Green Berets.^[1] The film won the Academy Award for Best Picture of 1986. In 2007, the American Film Institute placed Platoon at #86 in their "100 Years...100 Movies" poll. British television channel Channel 4 voted Platoon as the 6th greatest war film ever made, behind Full Metal Jacket and ahead of A Bridge Too Far.

Plot

Chris Taylor (Charlie Sheen) is a young American who has abandoned college for combat duty in Vietnam. The year is 1967. Upon arrival, he sees dead soldiers in body bags being loaded into his plane, but more distressing to him is the shellshocked state of a leaving soldier with the thousand-yard stare. Taylor and several other replacements have been assigned to Bravo Company, 25th Infantry division, "somewhere near the Cambodian border." Worn down by the exhausting work and poor living conditions, his enthusiasm for the war wanes and he develops an admiration for the more experienced soldiers, despite their reluctance to extend their friendship.

One day, another new arrival, Lieutenant Wolfe (Mark Moses) discusses the plans for a patrol later that night with the platoon sergeants: the compassionate Sergeant Elias (Willem Dafoe), harsh Staff Sergeant Barnes (Tom Berenger), cowardly lifer Sergeant Red O'Neil (John C. McGinley), and drug addict Sergeant Warren (Tony Todd). Barnes and Elias argue over whether to send the new men out on a patrol that is likely to be ambushed. O'Neil insists that the new troops go out instead of sending out several of his men who are nearly finished with their tours of duty. Barnes agrees, only on the condition that O'Neil himself go out as well as the new men.

That night, Taylor's sleeping unit is set upon by a squad of North Vietnamese Army soldiers. Gardner (Bob Orwig), a fellow new recruit, is killed, and another soldier, Tex (David Neidorf), is maimed. Despite having passed the watch duty to Junior (Reggie Johnson), a more experienced soldier who fell asleep, Taylor is blamed for the casualties (O'Neil is also to blame; he threw the grenade that maimed Tex). Taylor discovers a light wound to his neck, and he is sent to the field hospital for treatment.

Taylor returns from the hospital and through a soldier named King (Keith David), gains acceptance from the "heads", a tight-knit group in his unit that socializes, dances, and consumes drugs in an underground clubhouse. Elias is the leader of the "heads". Next door, more conservative members of the unit drink beer and play cards. As the patrols continue, Taylor becomes a more seasoned soldier, no longer standing out amongst the others.

During one patrol on January 1, 1968, two members of the platoon, Sandy (J. Adam Glover) and Sal (Richard Edson) find an abandoned bunker, stumble onto a booby trap, and are killed. Shortly after, a soldier named Manny Washington (Corkey Ford) goes missing. His mutilated body is found tied to a post close by. The platoon reaches a nearby village, where a food and weapons cache is discovered. Despite the villagers' denials, Barnes believes they are aiding Viet Cong soldiers and shoots the wife of the village chief in the head. The other soldiers explore the village. In one house, Taylor discovers a disabled boy and his mother hiding in a ditch beneath the floor. He harasses and taunts the boy, and Bunny (Kevin Dillon) beats the boy to death. Outside, Sergeant Elias arrives and gets into a fistfight with Barnes over the incidents. Lieutenant Wolfe ends the fight, and orders the men to burn the village. As the men leave a group of the soldiers drag a Vietnamese child to the bushes with the intentions of raping her. Taylor sees the attack and stops the group from raping the girl.

Upon returning to base, Elias reports Barnes' actions to Captain Harris (Dale Dye), who cannot afford to remove Barnes due to a lack of personnel. O'Neil and Bunny, nervous about the possibility of an investigation, speak to Barnes and Bunny suggests fragging Elias. Taylor speaks of this as "a civil war in the platoon. Half with Elias, half with Barnes." On their next patrol the platoon is ambushed and becomes pinned down in a firefight. Flash (Basile Achara) is killed and Sergeant Warren (Tony Todd) and Lerner (Johnny Depp) are badly injured in the resulting skirmish. Lieutenant Wolfe calls in wrong coordinates for artillery support, resulting in the deaths of Fu Sheng (Steve Barredo), Morehouse (Kevin Eshelman), and Tubbs (Andrew B. Clark) and severely wounding Ace (Terry McIlvain). Big Harold (Forest Whitaker) has his leg blown off by a booby trap while trying to escape the artillery barrage. Elias, with Taylor, Rhah (Francesco Quinn), and Crawford (Chris Pedersen), go to intercept flanking enemy troops. Barnes orders the rest of the platoon to retreat to be airlifted from the area, and goes back into the jungle to find Elias' group. After sending Taylor, Rhah, and Crawford (who has been shot in the lung) back, Barnes finds Elias. Barnes fires three rounds into Elias' chest and leaves him for dead. Barnes reaches the helicopter, telling the others that Elias is dead. After they take off, a severely wounded Elias emerges from the jungle, running from a large group of NVA soldiers. As the helicopter circles overhead, he dies after being shot several more times by the NVA.

At the base, Taylor attempts to talk his group into killing Barnes in retaliation, and King agrees with this, while Doc Gomez (Paul Sanchez) believes they should wait for military justice to decide Barnes's fate. Rhah relates a story of how Barnes had been mortally wounded several times (including being shot in the forehead at Ia Drang) and says that Barnes cannot be killed by anyone but himself. While drinking, Barnes overhears Taylor calling for his murder, and enters the room, daring them to kill him. No one takes up the offer, but as Barnes leaves, Taylor attacks him. Barnes manages to get the upper hand, and holds a knife to Taylor's face. However, Rhah talks Barnes out of killing Taylor, so he leaves, but not before cutting him under the eye.

The platoon is later sent back to the ambush area in order to build and maintain heavy defensive positions against potential attack. Rhah is promoted to Sergeant, commanding the remains of Elias's squad. The platoon is so severely weakened, though, that there are numerous gaps in their defense. When this is pointed out to him, Lt. Wolfe only replies that he does not care any more. The troops cope with the incoming battle, during which they know the majority of them will die. Just hours before the battle, King is allowed to go home as his tour of duty has come to an end. O'Neil tries to use Elias's R&R days for himself in order to escape the incoming battle (in which he believes he will die). When he asks Barnes for permission, Barnes refuses. Junior tries to escape the battle by spraying mosquito repellent onto his feet and passing it off as trench foot. Bunny states that he feels no remorse for the murders he has committed, saying that he enjoys Vietnam, and goes on to proclaim himself to be Audie Murphy.

Francis (Corey Glover), one of the last few remaining "heads", is in the same foxhole as Taylor. That night a large attack occurs, and the defensive lines are broken. The command bunker is destroyed by a suicide bomber (Oliver Stone makes a cameo as the commanding officer inside the bunker). Many members of the platoon are killed, including Lt. Wolfe, Parker (Peter Hicks), Doc, Bunny, and Junior. O'Neil survives only by hiding under dead bodies. Captain Harris orders the Air Force pilots to "expend all remaining" inside his perimeter. During the chaos, Barnes and Taylor come face-to-face. As Barnes is about to kill Taylor with a shovel, the two are knocked unconscious by a last-ditch American napalm attack.

A wounded Taylor regains consciousness the next morning and finds Barnes, who is also wounded. Taylor aims an AK-47 rifle at Barnes, who at first orders him to call a medic, but than dares him to pull the trigger. Taylor shoots Barnes three times in the chest, killing him. He then collapses and awaits medical attention. Francis emerges from his foxhole and stabs himself in order to be medevaced. O'Neil is found by other Americans, and Harris gives him command of the platoon. As he is loaded onto the helicopter, Taylor is reminded by Francis that because they have been wounded twice, they can go home. After bidding farewell to Rhah, Tony Hoyt (Ivan Kane) and Ebenhoch (Mark Ebenhoch) (his last surviving friends in the platoon; the other survivors are Rodriguez (Chris Castillejo), Huffmeister (Robert Galotti), and O'Neil), Taylor boards his helicopter. The helicopter flies away and Taylor weeps as he stares down at the destruction, while he (from a future perspective) narrates that he will forever be in Vietnam, with Barnes and Elias battling for what Rhah called "possession of his soul", and that he believes he and other veterans must rebuild themselves, and find goodness and purpose in their lives.

Cast

Development

After his tour of duty in Vietnam ended in 1968, Stone wrote a screenplay called Break: a semi-autobiographical account detailing his experiences with his parents and his time in Vietnam. It featured several characters who were the seeds of those who would end up in Platoon. The script was set to music from The Doors; Stone sent the script to Jim Morrison in the hope he would play the lead (Morrison never responded but the script was returned to Oliver Stone shortly after Morrison's death by Morrison's manager - Morrison had the script with him when he died in Paris ). Though Break went ultimately unproduced, it was the spur for him to attend film school.^[2]

After penning several other produced screenplays in the early 1970s, Stone came to work with Robert Bolt on an unproduced screenplay, The Cover-up. Bolt's rigorous approach rubbed off on Stone, and he was inspired to use the characters from his Break screenplay (who in turn were based upon people Stone knew in Vietnam) as the basis for a new screenplay titled The Platoon. Producer Martin Bregman attempted to elicit studio interest in the project, but Hollywood was still apathetic about Vietnam. However, the strength of Stone's writing on The Platoon was enough to get him the job penning Midnight Express in 1978. Despite that film's critical and commercial success, and that of other Stone-penned films at the time, most studios were still reluctant to finance The Platoon, as they feared a film about the Vietnam War would not attract an audience. After the release of The Deer Hunter (1978) and Apocalypse Now (1979), they then cited the perception that these films were considered the pinnacle of the Vietnam War film genre as reasons not to make The Platoon.^[2]

Stone instead attempted to break into mainstream direction via the easier-to-finance horror genre, but The Hand (1981) failed at the box office, and Stone began to think that The Platoon would never be made. Stone wrote Year of the Dragon (1985) for a lower-than-usual fee of $200,000, on the condition from producer Dino de Laurentiis that he would then produce The Platoon. De Laurentiis secured financing for the film, but struggled to find a distributor. Because de Laurentiis had already spent money sending Stone to the Philippines to scout for locations, he decided to keep control of the film's script until he was repaid.^[2] Then Stone's script for what would become Salvador (1986) was passed to John Daly of British production company Hemdale. Once again, this was a project that Stone had struggled to secure financing for, but Daly loved the script and was prepared to finance both Salvador and The Platoon off the back of it. Stone shot Salvador first, before turning his attention to what was by now called Platoon.^[2]

Production

Platoon was filmed on the island of Luzon in the Philippines, starting in February 1986. The production of the film on a scheduled date was almost canceled due to the political upheaval in the country with then-dictator Ferdinand Marcos, but with the help of a producer well-known in Asia, Mark Hill, the shoot went on as scheduled. The shoot lasted 54 days and cost $6.5 million. The production made a deal with the Philippine military for the use of military equipment.^[2]

James Woods, who had starred in Stone's previous film, Salvador, was offered a part in Platoon. He turned the role down, later saying he "couldn't face going into another jungle with [Stone]". Upon arrival in the Philippines, the cast was sent on a two-week intensive training course, during which they had to dig foxholes and were subject to forced marches and night-time "ambushes" which utilized special-effects explosions. Stone explained that he was trying to break them down, "to fuck with their heads so we could get that dog-tired, don't give a damn attitude, the anger, the irritation... the casual approach to death".^[2]

Stone makes a cameo appearance as the battalion commander in the final battle. Dale Dye, who played company commander Captain Harris, is a U.S. Marine Corps Vietnam veteran who also acted as the film's technical advisor. ^[1]

Music used in the film includes Adagio for Strings by Samuel Barber, "White Rabbit" by Jefferson Airplane and "Okie From Muskogee" by Merle Haggard. During a scene in the "Underworld" the soldiers sing along to "The Tracks of My Tears" by Smokey Robinson and The Miracles, which also featured in the film's trailer.

Reception

Critics both praised and criticized Platoon for its presentation of the violence seen in the war and the moral ambiguity created by the realities of guerrilla warfare, when unit leaders have to make a choice between saving the lives of their own men and taking those of suspected guerrilla sympathizers.

It shows some U.S. soldiers as violent and indiscriminate killers. Fueled by rage at seeing their friends killed and maimed by booby traps, they take their anger out on villagers who were found hiding a cache of firearms, killing and torturing Vietnamese villagers and setting their village on fire. The film has been banned in Vietnam.

The film currently has an 88% rating at Rotten Tomatoes and a Metacritic score of 86%.

Platoon's release was timely. During the mid-1980s there was a softening of attitudes towards Vietnam veterans (which had taken over ten years, since the last American soldiers pulled out of Vietnam in 1973). Sparked by the dedication of the Vietnam Veterans' Memorial in Washington, D.C., in 1982, Hollywood suddenly saw a small surge in films related to the war.

Awards and honors

• Winner of four Academy Awards; Best Picture, Best Director, Best Film Editing, and Best Sound.
• Nominated for Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Tom Berenger), Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Willem Dafoe), Best Cinematography and Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen.

American Film Institute recognition

• 1998 AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies #83
• 2001 AFI's 100 Years... 100 Thrills#72
• 2007 AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) #86

Marketing

The film was marketed with the tag line, "The first casualty of war is innocence", which was taken from Senator Hiram Johnson's assertion in 1917, "The first casualty of war is the truth."^[3] Several licensed tie-ins were released between 1986-1988. A video game was produced by Ocean Software for various formats. The Nintendo Entertainment System version was ported and published by Sunsoft. Loosely based on the film, the object of the game is to survive in the Vietnamese jungle against guerrilla attacks. A wargame was also produced, by Avalon Hill, as an introductory game to attract young people into to the wargaming hobby, and a board game was also produced.^[4] A novelization of the film was written by Dale Dye.

See also

• Apocalypse Now
• The Deer Hunter
• The Anderson Platoon
• Tour of Duty
• Hamburger Hill
• Full Metal Jacket

Notes

External links

• Platoon at the Internet Movie Database
• Platoon at Allmovie
• Platoon at Box Office Mojo
• Platoon at Rotten Tomatoes

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