The Deer Hunter (1978)
Michael
Cimino's powerful drama of Vietnam and its aftermath contained an
exceptionally controlled performance by Robert De Niro as the
focal member of a group of friends altered by the war and reunited
back on American soil.
It seemed America was finally ready for a film about the
horrors of the Vietnam War, aimed squarely at the heart of blue
collar middle American values, while combining the not-so-popular
big screen projection of sensitivity and heartrending friendship.
Robert De Niro, John Savage and Christopher Walken are three
Pennsylvanian steelworkers about to fight for their country.
We discover their friendship before, during and after the taste
of war has soured each of their individual psyches, which
ultimately slide down the well of ill-fated mortality.
The three friends who wind up in Vietnam are reunited under the
cruellest of circumstances when Michael, Nick, and Stevie are
taken prisoner. The physical and psychological horror endured by
the trio as they are forced to face each other in sadistic rounds
of Russian roulette is made all the more shattering by Michael's
strength and his barely controlled determination to will his
friends out of the nightmare.
Yet
even after he reaches the safety of home the ties to his comrades
are unyielding. Michael can barely bring himself to face Nick's
girl Linda (Meryl Streep), whom he has painfully adored from afar,
let alone consider usurping his friend's place in her bed. Nick is
his conscience and it is only after he has met his obligations to
his friends that he can consider reclaiming his own life.
While Cimino's portrayal of the Viet Cong is dramatically
one-sided, and the word "roulette" will never have a
glamorous connotation ever again, The Deer Hunter projects
the heroic tragedy of the common man to heights almost impossible
to follow.
The Deer Hunter was released to worldwide acclaim, with
Walken's tortured performance of a man giving up on his own soul
winning him a well-deserved Oscar as Supporting Actor.
The stirring anti-war drama also picked up Oscars for Best
Picture and Director, yet it's the haunting title theme by John
Williamson that clinches the whole deal.
|