Full Metal Jacket

Full Metal Jacket is a war movie portraying the atrocities of war that take place when two countries are engaged in combat. The movie is adapted from a well-written novel by Gustav Hasford who himself was a marine soldier and had served in the Vietnam War Seeing the war in close quarters is a very difficult experience that is very well portrayed in the novel.

Full Metal Jacket directed by Stanley Kubrick gives the audience a view of the war with all its problems and evils that cannot be avoided. The film derives its title from the weapons that are used in the war. The full metal jacketed bullets that are used as ammunition during war. The film is divided into two different parts that has the single war theme running through it. It chronicles the life of the U.S Marines who are recruited and then follows them throughout their training period seen from the eyes of the new recruit J.T Davis alias “Joker”. The first part of the film deals mostly with the inhuman treatment of the imperfect and out of shape private Gomer Pyle brilliantly played by Vincent D’Onofrio who’s slow but sure fall into insanity is presented in the first part.The actor had to gain almost 70 pounds to fit into the role of the fat marine, breaking the record of the well known Robert DeNiro where he had gained almost 60 ponds for his character in the film “Raging Bull’’.

Private Pyle is a slow and a dumb recruit who has certain imperfections that makes him the focus of the anger of everyone in his platoon. He also has to take a lot of flak from his leader Sergeant Hartman played by R.Lee Erney. The film portrays how the young marines are mentally as well as physically tortured in order to turn them from humans to killing machines. For the role of the abusive Sergeant the director wanted to have someone who was very convincing. Trivia has it that the director did not allow the members of his crew, especially Erney and his privates to interact much before filming started or even after. The first part of the film ends with Sergeant Hartman being shot by Pyle and his own suicide. The second part of the film starts in the warfront itself portraying combat with the Vietnam forces at close quarters. It concentrates on Joker and his career as a sergeant in Vietnam who is a war correspondent and covering the war for Stars and Stripes. The film had gained a lot of recognition in the form of nominations for an Oscar in the year 1988, and a Japanese Academy Award nomination in the next year. It also won the Boston Society of Film Critics Awards for the best director as well as best supporting actor for, R. Lee Erney.Wikipedia

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