Russian Roulette--Inherently 'Nam

Rating: 9/10 (11 December 2012)

The use of Russian Roulette in the film may at first appear as only a nominal detail, something to move a plot simply by its usage as a torture device; it may appear no different than other tortuous actions such as starvation, solitary confinement, or water torture. However, Russian Roulette has qualities that express the fundamental nature of Vietnam, making it a device that is not only gripping, terrifying, and animated, but also thematically relevant.
In the context of the film, Roulette is a lose-lose situation. In the presence of captors, a POW is expected to perform the action of Roulette on oneself, with two obvious outcomes. The prisoner either fires off a shot without ammunition, remaining physically unharmed (although psychologically wounded) or fires a bullet into their head. If the prisoner "wins" at their game of Roulette, they are only expected to do it again. There is no way to overcome the challenge. The same applies to the adopted veteran mentality for Vietnam. A soldier has two outcomes: become a casualty or not. If so, well--the negativity is apparent. If not, a soldier was to return home disillusioned, an object of disdain or uncertainty that was judged for voluntarily contributed to an immoral cause. As with Roulette, a veteran's fate was faced either physical or mental harm. It also faced repetition; if a man survived the difficulties of Vietnam, he had to face the difficulties of a scornful existence at home. If a man survived a round of Roulette, he had to endure the challenge of the odds yet again.
The director is attempting to demonstrate the helplessness, the raw brutality and lack of morality that the war went down in history for. It was not a gentleman's war; it was not one of compromise, prediction, or historical relevance. This was a new warfare, one that Americans (both those serving and those viewing the action on television, which occurred for the first time) had never witnessed before. It is a brilliant representation, both memorable and gripping attention, but also applicable to the core conceptual characteristics for which this hellish war is known.