Cinematic Brilliance

Rating: 10/10 (19 April 2007)

No movie before or after has effected me remotely as much as "The Deer Hunter" has. It is without a doubt the most emotionally driven, heartbreaking film I've ever experienced. The plot with it's simplicity instantly draws you into the lives of these characters which can easily be adapted to persons we all know or have known in our lives. The film opens to a small working class factory town seemingly isolated from the rest of the world. Main characters are established and we discover the underlying truth that seems to hang over everyone like a dark cloud. It is the middle of the Vietnam War, and three of the friends are volunteers to leave everything they know within the next few days. I break this movie into 3 parts, before, during and after the war. Before the war we see character development at it's best. We see 1 friend get married and experience a traditional Russian wedding. At one point DeNiro and Walken's characters encounter a soldier at a bar and when asked a response about their departure the soldier replies simply "fuck it". I thought this was a brilliant suggestion for things to come. The start of the second part begins by blowing your mind with a scene jump that is comparable to that of 2001:A space Oddyssey. Here we experience a game of forced Russian roulette onto the 3 friends. I remember the first time watching this scene barely able to keep control when placing myself in their position imagining what it would be like to play live and die with someone so close to you they are like your blood. When Robert DeNiro laughs in the face of his captors, sweat and tears streaming down his face, pleading his best friend to pull the trigger, it is without a doubt the most extreme example of raw emotion a movie has ever been able to produce. The final part of "The Deer Hunter" we see the aftermath that a war can bring, not on a nation, but of the families and friends and their relationships with one another. Whether drawn in or ripped apart, the impact on such a tightly knit group of individuals is devastating. In all,my favorite part of this movie is the message that I got from it. To me The Deer Hunter tells us that no matter what happens throughout our lives, we always have a home and there will always be someone there to lick our wounds and recover from the horrors that the world sometimes has. This is not an anti-war film and for those who may say it is have missed the picture. Agree or disagree with the diplomatic actions of a nation, America is beautiful because of the people in it and as long as we embrace, this we'll always have a home. WATCH THIS MOVIE!!! 10 out of 10 stars.