`The dead know only one thing: it's better to be alive'

Rating: 8/10 (22 August 2003)

Mr. Stanley Kubrick was not a prolific director. After 71 years walking this Earth he left us with only 16 movies among which some of the most powerful cinematic experience to date. `Full Metal Jacket' is part of Mr. Kubrick's list of masterpiece and was released 12 years before his last movie `Eyes Wide Shut' as War always precedes Denial.
Having a total control on his Picture from the writing to the editing, what you see on the screen is what he wanted you to seeand what we see is close to a perfect demonstration: One can learn to kill. Through this learning one looses his individuality. By loosing his individuality one can loose is Innocence and reach Madness and of course during all those steps something can go wrong To make this demonstration as obvious on paper as on screen you have to be methodic (as methodic as Stanley Kubrick) and you have to have the right actors and the right acting. Matthew Modine (Pvt Joker), Vincent D'Onofrio (Pvt Gomer Pyle) and R.Lee Ermey (Gunnery Sgt. Hartman) are a good example of how pristine the casting was. In order to draw a clear conclusion Stanley Kubrick used the chapter technique and delivers a 2 chapters demonstration.

Chapter One  The building of a Corp.  The Training. Here Mr. Kubrick shows us how a Marine Corp. is built, how one can learn to kill and how through this learning one looses his individuality. This building has to go through 2 major processes: Humiliation and Team building. The humiliation process consists in the destruction of your ego, because your ego is what makes you unique. If an organization breaks your ego then you are most likely to be just like everybody else. Private Gomer Pyle is the perfect example of how someone goes through this humiliating process: he is the most humiliated Private and we all remember this wonderful quote from the Gunnery Sergeant Hartman Drill Instructor (R.Lee Ermey):'Are you quitting on me?! Well, are you?! Then quit, you slimy *beep* walrus-looking piece of *beep*! etc' The second process in the building of a Corp., is in fact the team building process: It is an equally important process because at the end of this process each team member only exists through the team, alone each of them is `equally worthless' as our favorite Sergeant Instructor would say. Obviously something will go wrong because there is no such thing as invincibility (it's a chimer at best, a lie). The suicide scene is therefore the transition between the notion of individuality and the notion of Corp., between chapter one and chapter two. Admirably played by our 3 protagonist (Private Joker and Pyle and the Sergeant Drill Instructor) it emphasis the only true statement of the movie: `we live in a world of *beep*' and `the dead know only one thing: it's better to be alive'.
Chapter Two  Disintegration of a Corp.  The War. This second piece of the demonstration (one can loose his innocence) is fueled with two dynamics: the desire of the killing and the reality of war. The desire of the killing is impersonating by Pvt `Joker', he is a combat correspondent who doesn't really understand the meaning of this War. At the same time he is `born to kill' and think that the combat will bring meaning to this absurdity. This contradiction is very well sum up in the following memorable quote from Pvt Joker: `I wanted to meet stimulating and interesting people of an ancient culture and kill them. I wanted to be the first kid on my block to get a confirmed kill.' As soon as Pvt Joker links up with Pvt Cowboy, Mr. Kubrick makes us dive in `the reality of war' and the disintegration of the Corp. begins: The lieutenant goes first with him the authority, one by one the Marines falls under the fire of a sniper. The climax of this chapter is the fugitive vision of the sniper. The platoon has reached the border of Madness, where `a day without blood is like a day without sunshine'. Did Pvt Joker found the meaning he was looking for? Can we control the dogs of war once we've unleashed them? Once again there is no lesson only one statement as the thoughts of Pvt Joker `drift back to erect nipple wet dreams about Mary Jane Rottencrotch and the Great Homecoming *beep* Fantasy.' He is `so happy that he is alive, in one piece and short. He lives in a world of *beep* yes. But he is alive and not afraid'.
Innocence is lost foreverleft on the ground by the corpses and their `Full Metal Jackets'.