The Deer Hunter: Response #2

Rating: 8/10 (13 May 2011)

Steve, Mike, and Nick are all very different people, yet their friendship works so well together. Mike and Nick are more outgoing and friendly. They aren't afraid to say what's on their minds; Steve is quieter and more nervous than the other two, and as a result. Steve doesn't say what's on his mind as much in a group setting, but rather pulls one of his two best pals aside to tell them what's bothering him.
Mike and Steve are both older than NIck, though, and Nick doesn't seem ready to go to war yet at the start of the film. He goes anyway, and the three get separated after the Russian Roulette scene. Later in the film, you find out that Steve is in a hospital for veterans with no legs, playing Bingo day after day. Mike goes to visit him and brings him home, even though Steve wanted to stay at the hospital. MIke is the only one of the three who comes out of the war with no physical deformities. Nick, unfortunately, dies; he's in Saigon, gone AWOL, and lost a game of Russian Roulette.
Maybe if Nick hadn't been so young when he went into the war, he wouldn't have gone AWOL and played game after game of Russian Roulette until he could no longer remember Mike, his best friend. Mike did everything he could to make Nick remember him, but in the end, it didn't matter. Nick died anyway, shooting himself in the head.
It wouldn't have happened differently since Nick didn't have a choice; he was drafted at a young age and went into the war before he was ready. Nick had a hopeful future. He was engaged to a woman he loved and was all ready to start his life with her when he got back. The war changed all three of them, but it affected Nick in the worst ways.