The three main characters and how the war changed them.

Rating: 6/10 (14 May 2008)

#2) In the beginning of the movie the director chose to show the three main character at a wedding. The wedding if Steve's and he is marrying a girl who is pregnant with another mans child. Steve knows this but decides that he doesn't care and is going to raise that child as if it were his own. This event shows how innocent Steve is and how sensitive and emotional he is. It is those qualities that get him in trouble when he goes to fight in the Vietnam war. He is too weak and basically has a mental break down. He ends up almost dying in the pow and then after Mike saves him he breaks both of his legs because he couldn't hold on the the rescue helicopter and falls into the water. At the end of the movie Mike finds him in a hospital. Steve had lost both legs and one of his arms.
Mike is shown in the beginning of the movie as this guy who always follows the rules. When he is talking to Nike he mentions that when he goes hunting, he has to kill the deer with one shot. That was how he was taught and that was the way he was going to do it. The movie also shows how Mike has this connection with his best friend's girl. Mike would never be with her though because he felt as though it was wrong to take his friends girlfriend. There is also a scene where one of Mike's friends asks him to borrow his extra pair of hunting boots. Mike won't give them to him. His reasoning was that they won't be together when they go to fight and that they need to learn how to fend for themselves. Mike is the only character that was able to withstand the events of the war and then come back home pretty unsecured and able to go on with his life. He stayed strong throughout the whole film, even though most men couldn't.
The last character, Nike, was shown as the one who loved his life and was very open about his feelings. He was always trying the help other people. When they were hunting the first time, Nike wanted Mike to give the other guy his boots. He couldn't understand why Mike wasn't giving them to him. He thought he was just being a jerk. At one point before the they leave, Nike makes Mike promise that he won't leave him over there no matter what. Nike was afraid and wearing his heart on his sleeve. The stress of the war eventually makes Nike snap and he just loses it. He leaves the war without permission and start to play Russian roulette for money. He is a completely different person and won't go home. When Mike goes back to Vietnam to find Nike, he sees that Nike had been experimenting with drugs and had completely lost his mind. Nike ends up losing the game and Mike watches him shoot himself.
Brianna Block 4