Lite Metal Jacket

Rating: 8/10 (6 May 2020)

Jarhead is a war movie that's as much about war as Raging Bull was about boxing. That is, it's a film about isolation, boredom, and when you just boil it all down, sexual deprivation. Jarhead has a premise to be exceptionally good, and at times, it is. But it's storyline is messy. If Anthony Swofford was an unreliable narrator in the purest sense of the word, that would be okay. Throughout the film, we are given a glimpse into his fears of coming home to an unfaithful girlfriend, as his brothers in arms fantasize about sleeping with her. These scenes, in particular, really stuck with me. Already tormented with insecurity, it would have been really powerful had Jarhead focused in on Anthony's growing paranoia about his relationship. Mendes only makes this aspect one of the many symptoms of the isolation of war. To that effect, Jarhead on the whole feels like a spiritual reboot of Full Metal Jacket. Not that that's a bad thing, but it's not something we haven't seen before.