Section 1: Stanley Kubrick
Kubrick must have been inspired by French philosopher Albert Camus who believed that life has no inherent meaning and is, therefore, absurd. In a way, this might be the reason for despair that can lead us to end our own lives. On the other hand, Camus stated that a meaningless universe is an opportunity to free ourselves from the shackles of hope and experience existence more fully. Philosophical suicide is what Albert Camus called the solution of faith. He acknowledged that reason has limits and that what goes beyond our understanding is indeed inscrutable. Kubrick admired such a philosophy (Abrams and Jerold) in that the human has the free will to live with the circumstances to life, or we can ignore it. The philosophy of existentialism plays a significant role in his career and works.
Kubrick always wanted to come up with a basic style of war outlined with existentialism. He did not necessarily come up with the Vietnam War, but the phenomenal of war. Kubrick was interested in watching the transformation of young men into killers (Carew and Anthony) touring the happenings when the youth are bullied into giving up a piece of their humanity and exchange it for brutality. Kubrick always looked for short-form material that he could adapt. He had probably read about Gustov Hasford, The Short-Timers and the reason he liked it was because it had humor, craziness, and was totally off the wall, and that was what motivated him to come up with “Full Metal Jacket.”
Section 2: Vietnam War and the controversies
The Vietnam War can be best described as one of the most controversial wars ever in the history of the U.S. The statement can be backed with several proven facts. False news and fake media coverage mixed with dishonest governance are just a part of the many reasons behind this. To help understand this watershed moment was asking the question of how a global superpower suffered such a humiliating defeat (Burns). The leaking of the pentagon papers also dispelled any justifications for the war and revealed atrocities such as massacres, further increasing the chants against war across the nation (Turse). A line for the division was drawn between those who were in support of the war and those who were against it. The casualties suffered in the war and were now seen in a new light. With so many men having been lost thus far on the other side of the world and they were not even winning while the NVA could strike any time.
Faced with crushingly public opinion, the American government was forces to withdraw the nation’s troops in 1973, and two years later, the NVA finally captured Saigon ending the conflict. The celebration was not worth it, but the Vietnamese people had hope of a future even after they had lost their loved ones, relatives, and friends.
The war inspired Kubrick to come up with a movie since many attributes to civil rights were compromised. Many people were killed for the wrong reasons, and their lives may have seemed to be meaningless. The lousy person was made to look good, and in this regard, the American Army is to be blamed for the atrocities that took place during the war.
Section 3: “Full Metal Jacket”
Full Metal Jacket is a movie that may seem to be a documentary of the life of the recruitment of marines, but it is more than that. The film kicks off with the depressing experience in recruitment and how an individual gets suicidal. Exposure of the dangers of being bullied in the marines is expressed when one of the actors, Pyle, shoots himself after shooting the general in the washrooms. The last fifty minutes of the movie or so is taken to Vietnam, where the oppression of the Vietnamese people is exposed by a scene of one of the soldiers shooting innocent civilians, including women and children. The movie revolves around one actor who is nicknamed “Joker” by his general in the corpse. Joker becomes a marine journalist and gets the privilege of witnessing events that occurred during the war. He advocates for peace and truth, but his advocacy is far from becoming a reality as he is stuck between fighting for the American Army and fighting for peace.
It is not hard to understand why people love the first forty-five minutes of the movie. It has the best acting that has been witnessed before and has a massive sense of humor to the viewers. The bad thing is that the first forty-five minutes are so good that it hurts the rest of the movie. The audience is so caught up in the first forty-five minutes that they tend to deviate from the message Kubrick was trying to send for the entire one hundred and sixteen minutes. The biggest reason why the audiences check out after the island section is because Cooper does not follow the cliché three-act screenplay format. This break from the Hollywood structure is what made audiences either hate or love Kubrick films. At “Full Metal Jacket,” instead of making one film with three acts, Kubrick formed three short films with occurring characters. I believe this because of the specific use of fadeouts used to stop and start new parts of the film. This is proved when one of the actors, Pyle, puts the gun into his mouth and pulls the trigger to blow his brains out. Film two starts with a sex worker trying to seduce “Joker.” The end of cinema two is when one of the soldiers takes in a sex worker, and immediately the third film is kicked off with the scene on the battlefield.
It is essential to note down the reason Kubrick structured the movie in three different short films. He did it to show how the Vietnamese war was incorrectly described to the people of America and the occurrences that took place on the battlefield. Drill instructor, Hartman describes it to his trainees as a rivalry between communism and the American ideology. However, Hartman’s description of battle rarely took place.
General War and The Vietnam War
Nick Turse exposes the acts of violence by the American Army as he explains the massacre that took place where innocent civilians were brutally tortured and killed. Reports of such malicious actions were pushed away, and reporters were forced to keep quiet by the American government. “Kill Anything That Moves” is a book that can be compared to the events and scenes that occurred in “Full Metal Jacket,” especially when one of the soldiers admits to killing both women and children. He had a stoned heart. It is still ironic that the military was fighting for the wrong side of Vietnam and executing the team that upheld morality. In other words, the reasoning for the war was baseless in terms of morality.
The immense casualties in any given war are the loss of civilian people. They are the easy target and abused, tortured, and killed. During the war in Vietnam, thousands of people were killed and massacred by falling victim to the heavy firearm. It is a pity that violence is the solution to solving the conflict of interests between two conflicting parties. Innocent lives are lost, and children are orphaned, putting the future of a nation in doubt.
Section 4: Joker the existentialist rebel
Throughout the movie, Joker is his being. He refuses to become the ideal person the boot camp manufactures. He does not become the killer that he was intended to become like the rest. He decides to join the journalism department rather than fight out on the battlefield like most recruits. His passion for journalism is not lost since he had the mph to become a journalist ever since High School. Therefore, Joker does not lose his individuality to the Army but instead retains it, unlike the other recruits.
Joker had the role of pealing the mask that the face of the American Army wore. He was to report the events of the war to the media as it was but could not. His seniors wanted to make sure the stats and facts were meaningful to the American people and government. During an interview with a marine, the Marine speaks of the killings of the Vietnamese civilians and how some were buried alive. In the same scene, a colonel questions Joker’s peace symbol and “Born to Kill” written on his helmet. Joker explains that it is to demonstrate the duality of men.
During a severe meeting with his colleague journalists, He asks if the situation means that Anne Margaret, an American singer, was not coming. This is an example of the rebellious existentialism he consistently portrays throughout the movie.
Any other theme could replace the war theme, and the movie will still have its message intact. The meaning of the film could be how individuals may fall victim to being made machines and losing their born personalities. Kubrick, however, used the war to describe best his message of how people lose their focus of being their self-creature with the circumstances at hand. The individual becomes a cog in a machine, only a part of a system.
Hartman and Pyle indulge in a relationship that is observed by the viewers. Despite the actions of Pyle in the movie, we have to fully understand who Joker was and his role in all that occurred. Out of all the characters, he maintains who he is and what he stands for as an individual. He does not fall into the traps of being brainwashed by Hartman, just like the other soldiers.
Joker pokes fun at the archetype of the American soldier and the clichéd conduct of the dominant male. He makes it clear to Hartman that he has got no religious affiliations with the Virgin Mary. Hartman seemed impressed by the firm beliefs Joker stood for in which may be contrary to what the viewers expected. The Drill Instructor is impressed and makes him a captain among the corps. Pyle is moved by this act and looks up to Joker for this act.
Section 5: Boot Camp, and Denigration of Women, and Pyle
The life of a recruit can seem to be a nightmare whereby the individuals lose their precious civil livelihood of the world and exchange it for a new outlook to life. They are physically and mentally changed from regular civilians to an entirely new being. Joker is a character trait who expresses the realities of experience in the boot camp. Joker tries to crack a joke about the Drill Instructor, but he is quickly brought down by the D.I. and is forced into respect. Joker makes no other joke in the boot camp after that experience.
The mockery of religion is meant to show that religion is not a priority to the military, but saving lives is. The Drill Instructor uses the Virgin Mary in sarcasm. He says that the toilets should be cleaned to the extent that the Virgin Mary can use the bathroom. His disrespect to Christianity is an expression that he disrespects the real world and only cares about the priorities of a trainee of the boot camp. Hartman goes to the extent to mock Jesus by saying he has an erection for the Marines. He makes it seem that Marine is what Jesus wants and that there is a divine connection with the marines and God. Joker expresses that he does not believe in the Virgin Mary, and such disbelief promotes him to attain a post among the recruits.
The audience may tend to feel the intensity in the boot camp as they watch the mistreatment of Pyle. The Drill Instructor wants to make his recruits fond of him. Out of all the rookies, Pyle is noticeably the worst and is fond of failure. Throughout most of the scene, he scuffles through the vigorous training. However, the intense abuse makes him fall in love with his firearm, and eventually, he becomes Hartman’s ideal masterpiece. Out of the blue, Pyle is manufactured as the perfect killer for the military, but “there is no happy ending to the making of a bomb waiting to explode.” Hartman is victimized to the making of such a killer and is shot in the chest by Pyle.
By far, the brutal Drill Instructor has a hilarious and humorous character that makes the audience glued to their screens, and it can be argued that his absence is the reason why boredom kicks into the second half of the movie. It is close to impossible to understand what Kubrick intended to bring out in the movie after the first viewing. Viewers who watch the movie for the first part may get lost throughout the second part with a different gear from the first part.
Hartman has an objective of changing Pyle’s weak personality and change him into a war machine. But the transmission does not go as planned out. Leonard is on the right trail to being the “don’t care” personality on the battlefield, such as “Animal Mother.” Pyle seems to portray similar characters like that of the Animal Mother. Animal Mother’s helmet even has the quote “I am become death” written on it. He is the finished article of a vigorous training camp that breaks an individual down. In regards to such transformation, Leonard almost became like Animal Mother. He could easily set up his gun and was well familiarized with shooting as well to the extent of being applauded by Hartman.
In war, the biggest casualties are civilian populations, mainly women and children. Kubrick showed this in a typical scene of Pyle sucking his thumb and the little-year-old sniper, who was a girl. Hartman symbolizes the father’s role in a family of being strict and pushing the child in a family. Pyle, on the other hand, symbolizes the child who continuously gets beaten up by the father and pushed to standards that the father expects. At the same time, Joker may be portrayed as the mother in the family as he is forced into supporting the child to the command of the father. It is even pointed out by Hartman that Pyle is a broken child of bad parents. In the last scene of the first chapter, Hartman mocks Pyle by asking whether his parents never gave him enough attention as a kid. Straight afterward, Pyle responds by shooting Hartman in the chest. This shows why Pyle spares Joker’s life. He was willing to kill the father but could not kill the mother. Despite Pyle not killing the “mother,” it is proven how women are oppressed in a family and act on the command of the man of the house.
We can state that Pyle was influenced by the humanity of Joker and the brutality of Hartman. Joker teaches Pyle to be a responsible recruit, and Hartman encourages hi to be a brutal psychopath ready to kill. After part one, Leonard processes a hybrid character of a psychopathic killer diluted with a teaspoon of humanity.
Section 6: Joker in Vietnam
At the beginning of the part in Vietnam, Joker gets a chance to make a deal with a prostitute to have sex with her together with his colleague. During this scene, his camera gets stolen by a passer-by who has acquaintances and is ready to help him escape from the crime. This is the part of Vietnam that the military is fighting for.
Joker sarcastically joked about his presence by stating why he was in Vietnam during an interview. He said that he wanted to see exotic Vietnam, which was the jewel of Southeast Asia. He goes ahead to say that he wanted to meet stimulating people of an ancient culture and then kill them at the same time. He wanted to be the first kid on his block to get a confirmed kill. His sarcasm portrays a conflict of interest, and he explains that there was no point in killing innocent people who were rich in culture and lived in a beautiful environment.
In Vietnam, Joker is caught in the middle of two personalities. We can prove this statement by using the scene of him trying to kill the sniper despite him being “born to kill.” He has to kill the girl who is powerless and weak with the many gunshots she has faced. Joker now has to make his first kill and get rid of a part of his humanity like Leonard. The soldiers give him a pat on the back and recommend him for shooting the enemy, something he thought he could not do. From this, a part of his humanity is lost. Ever since the beginning of the movie, we portray Joker to be a fighter of peace and harmony, but shooting the sniper was least expected from him, just like Pyle shooting the Drill Instructor.
At the end of the movie, it is very ironic for the soldiers to be singing a children’s cartoon song in unison. They sound like psychopathic killers and have all fallen to the project of the Drill Instructor. All of them have been dehumanized.
Section 7: The Little Girl from Hanoi
During the Vietnam War, the American Army used one of the most intense bombings carried out in war history. The affected were women and children as they seemed to be powerless individuals who had done nothing to spearhead the cause. The bombings were carried out during Christmas, and during this period, the American rained drops of bombs in Hanoi, which killed the girl’s mother and sister. The movie can be compared with “Full Metal Jacket,” which equally portrays the brutality of the military on the civilians with the Animal Mother finding joy in killing weak women and children. He uses a heavy weapon and shoots everyone that he sees from the helicopter. Such a scene is sickening and heartbreaking to the viewer as people lose loved ones in the middle of war despite their innocent nature. The same way these individuals were killed in the same way the little girl lost her mother and sister.
I would strongly ask the American people consider watching this movie because there is an explanation of how the war affected individuals both directly and indirectly. It shows how innocent children were vulnerable to having their lives affected by a war that the country blindly gets involved in (me123). The Americans found pride in the number of people they killed, but the pride was that of a bully targeting the smallest kid on the block.
Work Cited
Abrams, Jerold, Ed. The Philosophy of Stanley Kubrick. University Press of Kentucky, 2007.
Burns, K., Corrigan, B., Sanders, F. The Vietnam War. Penguin Random House Audio Publishing Group, 2017.
Carew, Anthony. “Stanley Kubrick.” Screen Education 92 (2019): 70.
“The Little Girl of Hanoi” – 1975 Vietnamese film, English subtitles You Tube uploaded by me123 May 9, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJjHHwkKgOo&t=100s.
Turse, Nick. Kill anything that moves: The real American war in Vietnam. Macmillan, 2013.