War is not worth wasting our youth

Rating: 1/10 (24 July 2013)

Full Metal Jacket is about the idea that war is not worth wasting our youth. It tries to prove this with two stories: the first is the marines training for deployment, the second is the marines in action in Vietnam.
The first story, the marines training for deployment, is told with two external plots: that of the not so bright marine Pyle trying to finish boot camp and the second is the entire class of marines trying to graduate. The class of marines succeed in graduating, but Pyle does not. He goes crazy after the harsh treatment meant to harden him to become a killer and commits suicide. So this story gets to the point that preparing for war is inhumane and not worth wasting our youth.
The second story is about the marines fighting to win the war in Vietnam. This is told with two plots: that of winning the war and the second of the declining morality of the marines. The war is not won, it ends ambiguously as the marines win a small insignificant battle and return to camp while the morality of the marines shows a constant decline and ends with our hero committing murder.
The movie is a great testament to the anti-war movement and a visual essay on the meaninglessness of war. But it is not a very engaging story. The first half of the movie makes a tight dramatic point that training marines to be killer has some inhumane consequences and proves it with Pyle's suicide. But the second half doesn't have an overall story arc to hang its hat on. The status of the main external plot of winning the war is left ambiguous. So the moral decline of our hero who has to commit murder at the end doesn't create as much meaning since the murder doesn't get us any further in winning the war.
One can argue that that's the point of the movie, is that these atrocities are senseless and meaningless. And that is true. But in terms of a dramatic story, the meaning of the action is lost because the filmmakers abhorred making winning the war into any resemblance of a real plot.
In the first half of the movie, Pyle's suicide is juxtaposed with the success of class of marines all graduating. Thus it makes the point that his suicide is not worth it for us to successfully train marines. But in the second half of the movie, Joker commits murder but this action is not juxtaposed with progression of any other plot. So the action loses the chance to create meaning through a consequence for his actions. It feels like the movie was cut off without any real resolution, like another 15 minutes were missing.
My Story Chart of the movie is at storycharts.ca