An Emotionally Shattering Film That I Can't Recommend Enough.

Rating: 10/10 (16 January 2015)

The Deer Hunter is a fascinating and intensively depressing movie that speaks levels. It won 1978's Oscar for Best Picture, despite its features. This was before Apocalypse Now, Platoon and Full Metal Jacket. It follows the same pattern of the effects of war, but The Deer Hunter is by far the saddest.
The Deer Hunter follows a group of blue-collar factory workers (De Niro, Cazale, Savage, Walken) in Pennsylvania who enlist to fight in the Vietnam War. As a three-hour epic, the film is divided into three parts: before war, war, and after war. The before war bit seems unnecessary and skippable, but it needs viewing just as much as the other scenes. We get a good look at each of their lives, with a main focus on De Niro and Walken. Savage gets married and the wedding bit is long and could be skipped. When the men go off to war, the horrors of Apocalypse Now and Platoon are squashed into less than an hour. Because this is its own creation and did not take anything from any movie, it is unique in that sense. In fact, because all the horrors of war are looked upon and condensed cleverly, and since the characters are so well-developed in the first period, the war bit is sadder and more intense than Apocalypse Now and Platoon. There's Russian Roulette and exploitation that is handled better than these phonies like 12 Years A Slave and Unbroken. When they get out of war, that is when the shattering begins. All men are scarred for life, with Walken a completely changed man whose world is quickly crumbling. He becomes obsessed with Russian Roulette and De Niro attempts to save him. All men are much different than how they were in the first Act. The first Act requires viewing to see exactly how war affects people. The first Act shows how they are, the third Act shows what they become, and the second Act shows how they become it. Because this tends to focus more on the before and after bits of war and not so much of the war itself, it is the best study of war effects and psychological messes. Even if you don't want to see a war movie and are just interested in people's minds and psychology, The Deer Hunter is the movie for you. If you want to see a first rate character study and first rate acting, The Deer Hunter is the movie for you. No matter your intentions, The Deer Hunter will not disappoint and you will never forget the effects on you.