The most emotionally shattering Vietnam War movie ever made!

Rating: 10/10 (25 July 2017)

Michael Cimino's filmmaking journey was hardly a bump-less ride. It seems that his name is unfortunately doomed to go down in history as of a director whose third film completely ruined his career—Heaven's Gate not only led a distinguished American studio into bankruptcy, but also enraged critics and the audiences to a degree of making every Cimino's future project destined to fail, both critically and commercially. After his second feature, the world simply expected him to keep delivering in the future. It's extremely difficult to live up to that kind of expectation when you introduce yourself to the world with a film like The Deer Hunter. The gloomy all-American epic story of three steel workers from a small town in Pennsylvania deeply and differently affected by the Vietnam war completely swept the United States off their feet back in 1978, earning five Academy Awards and turning the world's spotlights on Cimino in the process.
The movie has two important themes: friendship and war. With "The Lord of the Rings" featuring a somewhat full-blown friendship between Frodo and Sam (that sometimes borders on being overly- sentimental but works), "The Deer Hunter" represents a portrait of true, powerful friendship. This is superior to any of the scenes between Frodo and Sam in "The Lord of the Rings," the characters here are more realistic and empathetic, the performances more convincing. When he finds Nicky surrounded by men putting wagers on his life, Michael tries to bring him home, but Nicky just spits in his face. To reveal his feelings for Nicky, Michael holds a gun to his own head. "Is this what you want?" he taunts. "I love you, Nicky." And then he pulls the trigger and the barrel clicks: empty. Michael's face suddenly drains, a reflection of his inner relief.
The reason why the film is lengthy is because it rolls out like a legend rather than a documentary and its greatness is blunted by its length and one-sided point of view, but the film's weaknesses are overpowered by Michael Cimino's sympathetic direction and a series of heartbreaking performances from Robert De Niro, Meryl Streep, John Savage, John Cazale and Christopher Walken. But it's the De Niro character, Michael "Mike" Vronsky, the one that somehow finds the strength to keep going and to keep Savage and Walken going. Both on and off-screen, De Niro, as usual plays his part brilliantly. He survives the prison camp and helps the others. Then, finally home from Vietnam, he is surrounded by a silence we can never quite penetrate. He is touched vaguely by desire for the girl that more than one of them left behind, but does not act decisively. He is a "hero," greeted shyly, awkwardly by the hometown people.
The film perfectly manages to close it curtains (for America as well) with everyone at John's bar, singing "God Bless America". And they reverentially (freeze-framed) raise their beer mugs to Nick, as Michael toasts "Here's to Nick."
In truth, Cimino's The Deer Hunter has not aged as well as its younger brother, Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now (1979), but there are many legitimate reasons for this. Apocalypse Now was always imperfect, and, in ways no one could have anticipated; its very messiness, inscrutability, and shoehorned ending only gain stature as the perfect metaphor for the imperfect fiasco that was Vietnam.