A sobering tale of one soldier's experiences

Rating: 7/10 (5 November 2005)

"Jarhead" highlights one USMC soldier, Anthony Swoffords, and his experiences throughout the first Gulf conflict.
From an plot breakdown, "Jarhead" is just another story about soldiers during war. But with a strong cast, true screen writing, and terrific cinematic style, a sobering experience is bundled into two hours.
Let's get one thing straight: this is not a pro-war or anti-war film... and although I have seen other comments saying that Swoff (played by Jake Gyllenhaal) is anti-war or anti-military, he is neither. Swoff is simply a character who is not in the right place. He realizes the depth of his decision in signing a contract with the military while in bootcamp, but he continues to play the game rather than rebel. He continues to be a good soldier, respects orders, and hopes to see some action and get a kill.
Jake Gyllenhaal is the true star of this film, giving the best performance of his career. Jamie Foxx continues to show us he is ridiculously versatile, and Peter Sarsgaard gives a good performance, but there's a feeling that some scenes were missing regarding his character because we don't really understand him beyond being Swoff's partner and a (generally) level headed soldier.
Besides laughing with realistic military humor and feeling for the soldiers as they individually deal with the reality of war, the truly twisting subplot with Swoff's girlfriend (he doubts her loyalty to him while he is way) is incredibly well integrated that as the audience, you feel for Swoff because this is simply added pressure in addition to the anxiety of facing this yet unseen enemy.
Sam Mendes truly shows the stark and deadly beauty of the setting and occurrences during this war.