Nothing like Platoon

Rating: 1/10 (27 November 2005)

Spoiler - NOTHING HAPPENS
Spending two hours watching a cast of characters with no likability is torture. Every soldier there is excessively crude from the beginning and lacks any identifiable traits a moviegoer can relate to (save one guy who has a kid...wow). So, when characters crackup or die there is no reason to feel remorseful. That's part of the problem with the characters; the other part is the lack of back-stories for each character. Platoon and Full Metal Jacket had back-stories, why didn't Jarhead? Jarhead spent so much time beating the audience over the head with how the soldiers spent their waiting moments, which could have been time spent on back-stories. One thinks spending four months in a desert one would talk about each others lives other then who they have banged. Back-stories would have given depth to shallow characters who act retarded for the sake of being retarded and might have given audiences a reason to care if one dies or crackup.
Many of Jarheads moments seemed silly. For instance, the sergeant said he passed on a $100k salary working with his brother, and having a family so he could see "cool sh*t like this" -- a burning oilfield. WOW! What idiot passes on a life of peace and happiness so he can see a pillar of fire? One would think the sergeant would say something redeemable like protecting others so they might have peace. Instead, the audience gets a dumb explanation for joining the army.
The acting performances were pretty good and weren't Jarheads problem. I liked Jake Gyllenhaal from Donnie Darko and thought he did what he could in Jarhead. The other actors did okay, nothing that will ever stand out. Jamie Foxx continues to suck after getting lucky in Ray and continues his quest to copycat Denzel Washington.
How anyone compares this to either Platoon or Full Metal Jacket is beyond me. Platoon concerns the Vietnam War which is significantly more severe then some idiots in a desert complaining about not killing. Platoon's premise is the effects soldiers have after killing, which exemplifies the meaninglessness of war; whereas Jarhead says the same effects will happen from doing nothing. I am no student of psychology nor have I been in the army, but killing children and villagers (Platoon) cannot have the same effect as spending four months in a desert (Jarhead).
Jarhead deserved nothing close to a 7.3 and if you, the reader, value your money then rent Platoon instead. You don't need to sit through a two hour movie to realize there wasn't much combat in Desert Storm.