CONSENSUS #16. Full Metal Jacket (1987)

 

SYNOPSIS:  "Full Metal Jacket" is a three part tale of the Vietnam War.  The first part takes a group of recruits through boot camp.  They are trained by the most famous cinematic DI (R. Lee Ermey) in war movie history.  The second part has the main character (Matthew Modine) working for "Stars and Stripes".  The third part follows a small unit in Hue during the Tet Offensive.

BACK-STORY:  “Full Metal Jacket” began its long journey to the screen when director Stanley Kubrick (“Dr. Strangelove”, “Paths of Glory”, “Spartacus”) read about Gustav Harford’s novel "The Short Timers".  Kubrick convinced his good friend Michael Herr to flesh out a screenplay.  Herr had already written one of the great Vietnam War – "Dispatches".  Harford was also involved in the adapted screenplay that ended up with an Oscar nod (the only one the film garnered).  The movie was filmed in England because Kubrick hated to leave home.  The shoot lasted an exhausting 17 months.  Kubrick eschewed a big name cast.  Matthew Modine was coming off of “Birdie”.  Vincent D’Onofrio was making his debut.  He set a record by gaining seventy pounds for the role (breaking De Niro’s pigging out for “Raging Bull”).  R. Lee Ermey was hired as the technical adviser and put the actors through a boot camp that included him yelling at them for ten hours a day. 

TRIVIA:  Wikipedia, imdb, Mental Floss, Factinate 

1.  It is based on a novel by Vietnam veteran Gustav Hasford.  Kubrick changed the title because he thought audiences would mistake it for a story about slacker workers.  He got the movie title when he was perusing a gun catalogue.

 

2.  Kubrick had an idea to do a Holocaust movie with his good friend Michael Herr, who had been a correspondent in Vietnam and had written Dispatches.  Kubrick shifted the topic to the Vietnam War, but Herr did not want to revisit that territory.  Kubrick ran across Hasford’s book and decided to make it into a movie.  He developed a treatment and began to fine tune it with Hasford over the phone for many nights.  He convinced Herr to participate and basically chose between submissions by Hasford and Herr.  When Kubrick insisted on meeting Hasford face to face, Herr advised against him meeting the unstable Hasford.  Kubrick insisted and the meeting went as Herr expected.  Kubrick and Hasford never met again.

 

3.  When the movie was finished, Kubrick only wanted to give Hasford an “additional dialogue” credit.  Hasford fought this and was eventually given equal billing with Kubrick and Herr.  The adapted screenplay was nominated for an Academy Award.  It was the film’s only nomination.

 

4.  It was the last Kubrick film released in his lifetime and his second to last movie (“Eyes Wide Shut”).

 

5.  Matthew Modine got the role of Joker after being confronted in a restaurant by Val Kilmer.  Kilmer accused Modine of stealing the part.  Modine did not even know about the movie, but he contacted Kubrick and got the part.  He replaced Anthony Michael Hall whose deal with Kubrick fell through.  Bruce Willis was offered the role, but he was committed to the TV series “Moonlighting”.

 

6.  Vincent D’Onfrio got his part after submitting an audition tape (as all the cast did) using a rented videotape camera and dressed in fatigues.  He gained 30 pounds, but Kubrick just remarked that he looked like he could kick everyone’s ass.  D’Onfrio then gained a record 70 (going from 210 to 280).  The extra weight resulted in torn knee ligaments on the obstacle course.  It took him nine months to lose the weight.

 

7.  Modine kept a diary during the shoot which was published as Full Metal Jacket Diary.  The shoot was so long he got married, had a child, and saw its first birthday before it was over.  For the birth, Kubrick did not want to stop production so he could be with his wife until Modine threatened to cut himself with his pocket knife.

 

8.  Arnold Schwarzenneger was supposed to be Animal Mother, but he made “Running Man” instead.

 

9.  R. Lee Ermey had already played a D.I.  in “The Boys in Company C” nine years earlier.  He was hired as a technical adviser, but found the actor Tim Colceri lacking for the role of Hartman.  He auditioned by hurling a  constant stream of obscenities at a group of Royal Marine extras.  According to most versions of the story, he did this while having tennis balls and oranges tossed at him.  In a more logical version, once he got the part he would rehearse by having tennis balls and oranges thrown at him as he practiced his lines.  Maybe it’s both.

 

10.  Kubrick claimed Ermey wrote about 50% of his dialogue.  Ermey, however, stated that the dialogue was in collaboration with Kubrick.  Having read the book, I can attest that the legend that Ermey made up the insults is greatly exaggerated since most of the lines are in the book.  Kubrick kept the basic training actors away from Ermey and they did not rehearse before he laid into them.  They were yelled at by him for ten hours a day and had to have their heads shaved every week.

 

11.  Colceri was given the part of the crazy door gunner.  That scene was actually from Herr’s Dispatches.

 

12.  Denzel Washington wanted to play Eight Ball, but was not given consideration.  He later said it was a big one that got away.

 

13.  Joker’s real name was J.T. Davis, which was an homage to the first official American death in Vietnam.  Joker was supposed to die at the end, but Modine convinced Kubrick he would suffer enough PTSD for all he had witnessed.

 

14.  Originally, after the sniper is killed, Animal Mother cuts off her head with his machete and throws it out the window.  That was deemed too hard core.  The sniper is saying “so much pain”.

 

15.   The sequence leading up to the sniper’s lair took four weeks to film.  The jelly doughnut scene took 37 takes.

 

16.  The movie was made in England because Kubrick did not want to leave his home.  Boot camp was mostly filmed at an old RAF, later British Army base.  A rundown old factory scheduled for demolition stood in for Hue.  Kubrick examined numerous pictures from the Battle of Hue.  He used a wrecking ball to “sculpt” the set.  Modine’s diary tells of cast and crew illnesses caused by the plant’s asbestos and toxic chemicals.

 

17.  A Belgian Army colonel who was a fan of Kubrick loaned him four M41 tanks.

 

18.  Ermey broke all his ribs on one side in a jeep accident which put him out for four and a half months.

 

19.  Kubrick’s daughter Vivian (under the name Abigail Mead) wrote the score.  She also, with Nigel Goulding, wrote a promotional song entitled “Full Metal Jacket (I Wanna Be Your Drill Instructor)”.  It is a mash-up of Hartman’s bon mots.  It reached #2 on the charts in the United Kingdom.  You can hear it on YouTube.  (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vN5sYE96R2U)

 

Belle and Blade  =  3.5

Brassey’s              =  5.0

Video Hound       =  3.8

War Movies         =  N/A

Military History  =  #16

Channel 4             =  #5

Film Site                =  yes

101 War Movies  =  yes

Rotten Tomatoes  =  #28

 

HISTORICAL ACCURACY:  FMJ is not meant to be historically accurate.  It is based on a novel, but Hasford was a correspondent in Vietnam and supposedly based the book on personal experiences.   The boot camp segment is realistic as to Marine boot camp in 1967.  If anything, the movie underplays the physical abuse.  (The DI in the book is more brutal.)   The “Stars and Stripes” reporting strategy is accurate.  Da Nang was one of the targets for the opening Tet attacks (note the fireworks in the background – nice touch).  As far as Hue, civilians were executed by the Communists.  There was a sniper problem as part of the urban house-to-house combat, although the movie does not refer to a specific incident.  Last, but not least, there were hookers in Vietnam that offered to sucky sucky for ten dollars.  My only real problem is I doubt the sniper could have been that accurate using a standard AK-47 from that distance. 

OPINION:    “Full Metal Jacket” is not a perfect film, but parts of it approach perfection.  The acting is amazing, especially considering that the cast is far from all-star.  Modine does a good job as the main character and he is likeable.  It’s an assured performance considering his star billing is undermined by career-making turns by D’Onofrio, Ermey, and Baldwin.  D’Onofrio owes his career to this movie (which he readily admits).  For a debut, he knocks it out of the park.  His transition from grinning buffoon to malevolent nutcase is amazing.  It was a travesty that he did not get an Academy Award nomination.  Although Ermey had acted before (starting with 1978’s “Boys in Company C”), FMJ was his breakthrough.  He completely dominates all his scenes and Kubrick’s lensing abets this.  Watch him closely – the dude never blinks!  It is important to note that the control freak Kubrick allowed Ermey to improvise some of his lines.  (I must point out that many of his lines appear in the novel.)  In spite of all this, I do need to remind everyone that Ermey was essentially playing himself.  (Sorry, R. Lee.)  As far as Baldwin, he is perfect as Animal Mother and should still be kissing his agent’s ass for getting him the part.  Go to IMDB and see his resume.  (Not counting “Firefly”.)

                The movie is technically brilliant.  Not surprising since it’s a Kubrick film.  He took years to make it and the care is on the screen.  The cinematography is masterful.  The barracks scenes are especially noteworthy as the camera tracks Ermey in his transits.  There are several long depth shots that are well-composed (e.g. when the men pray to their guns).  When the film shifts to Vietnam, we get lots of shots with action in the background.  Watch the TV crew scene.  They are moving leftward, the Lust Hogs are stationary, and other soldiers move across the frame rightward.  Cool.

                The score is used very sparingly, but effectively.  It was done by Kubrick’s daughter Vivian and she uses some eerie music that fits the mood well.  Kubrick blends in some great contemporary songs.  The Hue set is great.  Kubrick used photos of Hue to adapt an abandoned gas works in East London.  (Modine claims they were exposed to toxins.)  This contrasts with the pristine atmosphere of the barracks.  The editing has been justifiably lauded.  For instance, Kubrick uses cadence runs to divide up the boot camp scenes.  He bookends the middle section with the hooker.  However, it is perplexing how he allowed the final assault on the sniper to go from six soldiers to eight back to six then eight and finally the original six.  WTF

                The plotting is fine, but not great.  The movie is essentially three parts with the boot camp segment dominant and hard to top.  This cannot be helped and critics have been too harsh on this.  Kubrick explores the themes of war destroys and war corrupts our young.  It is also clear that when you reprogram young men to kill, you end up with killers that may not have a steady moral compass.  The movie surprisingly does not take a clear stand against the war, although it is clearly anti-war.  The plot throws in some nice twists and avoids cliches.  Kubrick does include a military funeral scene, but what the eulogizers say is distinctly iconoclastic.  Animal Mother:  “Better you than me”.  The ending “Mickey Mouse” scene is an effective close.  Certainly better than the original idea of having Animal Mother chopping off the sniper’s head and them playing soccer with it.

                In conclusion, FMJ is one of the great war films and deserves consideration for the top ten of all time.  Kubrick made a unique film.  He stood the boot camp trope on its head.  He explored urban combat in Vietnam.  He gave us three memorable characters.  It was sadly underrated by The Academy.  Who would argue today that it is not better than “Moonstruck” for Christ’s sake?  And would you have guessed that the war movie nominated that year would be “Hope and Glory”?  A good war film, but come on!