Loses a lot on a second viewing

Rating: 7/10 (24 May 2010)

(Spoilers) I saw this movie in its original release and, upon a recent viewing, I could remember the basic idea of the story that follows three steel workers from their roots in a small Pennsylvania town, to a tour of duty in Vietanm, then back home.
What I remembered clearly were the Russian roulette scenes. These are big gut grabbers, but when I started to think about them in more detail, I began to question why they were in there beyond their being attention getters. The only reason I can see is their being a metaphor for the random violence and killing of war--but we already knew that. The scenes do not make a lot of sense. The games were surrounded by much chaos and heavy betting. As presented it appeared that a given game was played until one of the players lost his life and, if the betting was on who "won," then it would be a fifty-fifty bet and hardly a cause for such hooting and hollering. If the betting was on how long a game would last, then the distribution of wins and losses would be complicated and require the skill of a Vegas croupier to resolve. In any case the betters are seen throwing wads of money down into a pile on a table and I don't see how the money could ever have been properly split up among the winners. Given how much money Nick sent back to Steven the winner was apparently amply rewarded, but how he was paid off was not clear. By the time Michael catches up with him Nick's mind is so shot he does not even recognize his old friend, so how is it that Nick had the wherewithal to send money to Steven? If so, how did he arrange for that? Where were the betters getting all that money? The odds of Nick's winning as many times as implied would be astronomical. The bottom line for me was to find the Russian roulette scenes quite unbelievable and that undercut my appreciation of the whole movie, since those scenes are pivotal. And is it to be believed that Michael could find Nick in the total chaos of the fall of Saigon?
The hunting scenes struck me as odd. Nowhere near Pennsylvania are there mountains like the ones in those scenes. Perhaps those scenes were a warning to the audience that a good deal of the movie is to be symbolic rather than realistic, but I found the scenes precursors to a disjointed sequencing that persisted throughout the remainder of the film. Some of the symbolism is a bit too obvious. For example, during Steven's wedding the bride and groom are asked to drink chalices of wine and if they can do so without spilling any, they will have good luck. Then we see some small droplets of wine spilled on the bride's gown, symbolizing the bloodshed to come.
One thing that is well executed is the discrepancy between the youthful (perhaps played by actors not quite youthful enough) naivety of the three protagonists pre-war and the difficult post-war fallout. The bonding of the circle of the male friends pre-war had all of the maturity of early teens. By the end of the movie Nick was dead, Steven had lost his legs and was suffering mental and physical readjustments, and Michael, the strongest, was having his own problems reentering society. In fact the often puzzling reactions Michael had to returning home were for me the most moving scenes in the movie.
A good part of the first act of the movie is an exceptionally beautiful filming of Steven's wedding in a Russian orthodox church. That segment is almost worth the price of admission by itself.
I can't quarrel with the acting--the fine cast turns in quality performances. The editing is sometimes quite effective. After the wedding sequences we are abruptly put into the middle of the fighting in Vietnam; this emphasizes how the three friends must have viewed the transition. For those who lived through the Vietnam era, this movie will most likely bring back a lot of painful memories.
I find that most good movies improve on second viewing. This was an exception for me. I could not get beyond the improbabilities and emotional manipulations the second time around.