The Deer Hunter: Great?

Rating: 5/10 (16 September 2005)

This film is occasionally beautiful, but mostly embarrassing. There are shots with the crew in. There are shots with the boom in. There are inexplicable zooms and re-frames. The zoom removes us from the reality of the film because it draws unrealistic attention to the mechanics of the medium by distorting perspective with no clear cinematic purpose. There is inter-cut stock footage - 16mm!?- that is supposed to pass as principal photography, and no care whether there is match in color or texture with the surrounding picture. There are great shots - no doubt! the hunt, the river, the bar - followed by shots drowned in graininess. Was there a consciousness of continuity on the set AT ALL? With a great story and a great cast and a great crew, this film makes so many basic mistakes it is enraging.
This measurement of Deer Hunter (and other films) by its performances, in my view, misses the central point of the medium. Film, as Kubrick noted, is not theater. It is not the actors. An evaluation of a film must consider the technique of the filmmaker.
Film-making cannot ignore details. This film depicts a broad dramatic swathe, a canvas with parts that are very beautiful and moving and devastating, but with other parts where the painter couldn't care less whether the canvas had paint, or even whether the canvas had gaping holes - which The Deer Hunter definitely has. It patently ignores details. It is at best a first cut.
It appears to me that Cimino could not control his materials (cast, crew, story). The first section of the film has problems even if you accept the radical dramatic purpose so often tauted, characterization. I definitely agree with those that say it could be much much tighter. An Oscar for editing? I'm amazed. I got the sense of the characters within 20 minutes. Why do we need 1.5 hours of that? We know what is at stake much much sooner.
I would have done this in 3 parts, not 5. Remove the section where Mikey returns to USA, then goes back. Keep the hero in Vietnam, have Mikey and Nicky do their thing in Saigon. Then Mike comes back, tries to adjust, etc. Struggle for meaning, struggle to grieve, struggle to discover love, rediscover, etc. Then, the 2nd hunt: Mikey can't find the internal means to slay the deer, the shot goes astray. Then, the bar. Keep Johnny making the eggs in the kitchen, have him stay there, breaking down after humming a little of God Bless. Cut to the friends in the bar, they've overheard him. Exchange glances, no dialog, no glorification of America and total deflection of its potential for making a deeper statement against war. Just eyes, glances. Feeling. Visuals. Credits. 2hrs, tops. Remove the stupid stock footage. Keep it about Mike.
I'm not convinced this film is anti-war at all. The dramatic impact the effects of the war had on Steve are deflected into a denigration of Bingo and the VA instead of the horror that Mike's seeing Steve could have been ("...the horror..."). I would have upped Steve's role in the wedding, let us see him, how vital, how physical he was. Let War itself be on our minds when Mike sees him again. We admire Mike and his medals, his noble and dutiful achievements, how gorgeous he is in uniform, how he does the right thing. "God bless..." It is insulting. Like Private Ryan. IMO, a film that does not come down against War, is ultimately endorsing "some" war, and is therefore possibly pro-War.
An anti-war film is not a film that is anti-some-particular-war- filmmaker-doesn't-like-or-decides-to-use-as-a-cool-backdrop. It is a film that is against War, period. All War. No War is worth fighting. None. Anti-war also is not about hating bad wars that hurt Americans (witness Paths of Glory, Come and Behold, Stalingrad, Das Boot). This movie ends up not dealing with War (it deals with "a" war) and becomes some people missing their friend who dies.