Emotive, at times even emotional

Rating: 7/10 (2 December 2001)

After all the fame and glory that this film has received, and the fact that I had already seen `Born on the Fourth of July', with its due positive reflections, I only managed to see `Platoon' very recently.

Whereas there is no argument as to whether Stone is an excellent director, or that the cinematography is spot on and the principal actors  especially Charlie Sheen  play their rôles acceptably well, this bellicous drama more or less redeems itself as being a historical documentary rather than a film made for entertainment in the cinema  or on TV. One tends to tire of so many war films; however Oliver Stone does strike a chord, albeit only in a remorseful sense, and we have to remember that the cinema must also reflect human conditions at any given moment. Unfortunately Viet Nam's war existed, and somebody had to tell it. In the space of three years Stone turned from a war story-teller to a definite anti-war activist between these two films mentioned. I would rather like to see his `Heaven & Earth' (1993) in order to see where his thinking has led.
Stone does not stop short of showing all the ugliness and horror of war: he positively bombards us with it. There is nothing subtle. Indeed, it seems that such ingredients, together with assassinations and attempted murders of presidents, are the staple diet of his fetishness. `Platoon' is a visual impact that simply leaves you reeling; but from there to considering it a `great film' there is a great void.
Far more useful as a deployment of evoked sympathies over the Viet Nam war is `Casualties of War', directed by Brian de Palma and with Thuy Thu Le's soul-destroying peasant girl.
As far as the war in Viet Nam and films related to it are concerned, I have had enough. Hopefully we will not, in years to come, get more of this medicine in the form of Afghanistan .. bin Laden . Lebanon  Hezbollah  Iraq