The Deer Hunter (1978)
The basic storyMichael, Steven and Nick are three ordinary young factory workers who joins the Army, to fight in Vietnam. In Vietnam the three friends experience the horrors of the war, as they fall in the hands of the Vietcong and are brought to a prison camp. Here they are forced to play Russian roulette against each other, before they succeed in escaping.
Though the three friends survive the war, they are not all coming home. Those who return, changed by the war as they are, have to find their new place in life, in the community that hasn't changed since they left.
How was it?
Outstanding story about young men from a small community going to war in Vietnam, and how it affected them and the community, that only some of them survived. There are no super-heroes like Rambo in the movie, only ordinary people in tough and deadly situation, some of which acts like heroes and others don't. Not because they are especially brave or good or because they are cowards, but because they are humans with a specific mind-set and skills. You may or may not like some of the characters, but they make sense within the frame of the story, and contribute to a complex picture of human behavior.
To the best of my knowledge the movie shows a relatively realistic picture of how young Americans were sent to a dirty war, how they thought they were going to be heroes, and how many of them ended up feeling alienated, damaged in body and soul, and not like heroes at all. It is both brutal, relevant and fascinating.
Rating
★★★★★
182 min.
Color
- Michael Pilgaard