Overlong And Overrated

Rating: 6/10 (19 August 2004)

THE DEER HUNTER was a movie I'd heard about ever since it was released in 1978 . It received its first broadcast on British television in 1984 and since I was on holiday via the penal system I never got to see it . I did later ask my friends what they thought of it and they all discussed the bits involving torture by the Vietnamese on their American prisoners which made me thankful that I wasn't doing time in a Vietnamese jail . It wasn't until 1988 that I finally saw the movie and was bitterly disappointed and bored in equal measure
The problem with THE DEER HUNTER is with the script , it's shapeless and unfocused . Can anyone explain to me what the most important part of the story is ? Is it the wedding scene ? Is it the deer hunting scene ? Is it the prison scene ? is it ... ? I know it's difficult to write a script . In fact I once wrote a script entitled SOLITUDE a story of war and how it contrasts with peace which was set in the UK and Former Yugoslavia in the early 1990s . All the above criticisms made about Deric Washburn's script could certainly apply to mine ( In fact I describe it as " A British version of THE DEER HUNTER ) , but unlike SOLITUDE the script for THE DEER HUNTER was produced and it's amazing the studio or director Michael Ciminio didn't sit Mr Washburn down and say " Look this script is far too long , we can do without a good sixty pages that add nothing to the plot . Bring us back a script of one hundred and forty pages maximum "
!!!! SPOILERS !!!!
There's another problem with the script and that's the level of coincidence involved when the action switches to 'Nam . Nick ( Walken ) and Steven ( Savage ) disembark from a copter where they meet their old buddy Michael ( De Niro ) . What's the chances of that happening in real life ? It should also be pointed out that the three characters were drafted into the army at the same time but that now Michael is an elite Green Beret while Nick and Steven are still draftee infantrymen . Didn't Green Berets have to serve a certain amount of time in the army before they could apply to become special forces ? I'm thinking if Michael was special forces Nick and Steven would have completed their military service . This introductory sequence also seems to have been heavily edited so much that it doesn't make much sense . But back to the coincidences .... After being captured by the VC South Vietnamese and American prisoners play Russian roulette that ends with Steven being imprisoned in a bamboo cage and Michael and Nick being the remaining contestants in the Russian roulette sweepstake . Unlikely enough but then they play with a revolver that has three bullets , they play several times and never shoot themselves once , the revolver only seems to work when they point it at their VC guards . Believe me there comes a time when coincidence gives way to unlikely farce
There are some plus points to the movie such as the acting and seeing a movie where De Niro and Walken rising above material to put in truly great performances makes me very nostalgic . There's also a lot of little interesting stories surrounding the making of the film ( See the trivia page on the left ) but THE DEER HUNTER is very far from being a great movie far less being " The best Vietnam war movie " . You really do have to wonder how well APOCALYPSE NOW would have been received by the voters of the Oscars if it came out a year earlier
THE DEER HUNTER gets six out of ten