Platoon

1 9 8 6 (USA)

Establishing Oliver Stone's reputation as a truly outstanding filmmaker, the Oscar-winning (but inflammatory) Platoon gives absolute credence to the adage 'war is hell'. Sheen's middle-class boy (based on Stone himself) volunteers for Vietnam to fulfill his patriotic duty. Once there, however, the rookie recruit finds the stark brutality of the war stripping away his values and his humanity. 

As his tour of duty progresses, Taylor finds his unit becoming divided, forced to choose between two opposing father figures. One is the noble, courageous liberal, Sergeant Elias (Defoe, a hipster Christ), while the other is a scarred, racist, bullying beast - an eternal soldier doing it all to ensure his won survival - Sergeant Barnes (a brilliant performance from Berenger).

It is Barnes who leads the frustrated, terrified platoon into its own vengeful My Lai massacre. It's the movie's most terrible scene, but by the time it comes, Stone has captured such a sense of the constant confusion and fear experienced by young soldiers that you come to understand how such atrocities actually happen. You also develop a new appreciation of the bravery of men who can cling to their humanity in the face of the mob.

Platoon immerses the viewer in the 360 degree chaos of jungle warfare, blurring the lines between 'us' and 'them', leaving only the dissociated terror of firing through foliage at unseen foes and the fatality of young men facing imminent death. At the same time, it shows the terrible things grunts did in the name of Uncle Sam - taking drugs, shooting villagers (and making them dance) and singing out of key to soul classics.

Despite its roll call of future stars - Charlie Sheen, Willem Defoe, Johnny Depp, Forest Whitaker - it pays to remember that Stone had to make this movie outside the Hollywood system. With his script rejected by every studio in town, he shot the film in 54 days in the Philippines on a paltry $6.5 million budget, raised from European sources. Yet Platoon went on to win Oscars for Best Picture and Best Director, and set in motion a short cycle of 'Namflicks that swept Hollywood in the late 80s.

Stone first conceived his story in 1969, inspired by his own experiences as a combat infantryman, and also as something of a counterbalance to the flag waving of John Wayne's hawkish The Green Berets of the previous year. Stone's first-hand memories inform Platoon's sense of lived experience, the extraordinary feeling of cold sweat and humid jungle rot.

TRIVIA NOTES
In order to get into the big dope smoking scene, Willem Dafoe and Co. got hold of some genuine grass. But it then took Oliver Stone several hours to set up, by which time the actors had all crashed and wanted to sleep.

Johnny Depp's helmet is emblazoned with the name 'Sherilyn' in reference to his then-squeeze, Sherilyn Fenn.