In the Western Pennsylvania foundry town of Clairton, during the late 1960s, Russian-American steel workers Michael (Robert De Niro), Steven (John Savage), Nick (Christopher Walken), Stanley (John Cazale), John (George Dzundza), and Axel (Chuck Aspegren) are preparing for two rites of passage: the marriage of one and military service for three of them. The movie has a very well orchestrated soundtrack that is no dated like many movies from the 70's and 80's.They work together, hang out in a local bar and enjoy weekends deer hunting. But their placid life is soon to be changed after three enlist in the airborne infantry to go to Vietnam. Before they go, Steven marries the pregnant Angela, with whom he has not had sex, and their wedding party is also the men's farewell party. The hall is decorated with the boy's high school pictures and lots of American flags.Nick's girlfriend, Linda, makes breakfast for her father while wearing a bridesmaid's dress. Her father, an abusive and hallucinating alcoholic, is upstairs and alone, having an alcoholic attack and has trashed his room. Linda brings him his breakfast and he hits her a couple of times leaving a bruise on her face. She leaves for the wedding and takes her belongings to Nick's where she asks to stay for a while as the men are going away in service. Mike is upset and walks out when Linda shows up.At the Russian wedding reception, there is lots of drinking, ethnic dancing and wedding rituals. This is a very long scene and sets up the relationships and foreshadows some of what is to come. Mike spends a lot of the time at the bar drinking and watching Linda from afar. During the final ceremony of drinking from a dual wine cup, the convention is the couple wil have a good life if they don't spill any wine but the camera catches some drips on the bride's dress. Nick proposes to Linda after she catches the bouquet and she accepts. The bride and groom leave the party in Mike's decorated Cadillac and Mike chases after them stripping himself naked as he runs, winding up with Nick in a basketball court. Nick makes Mike promise to bring him back to Clairton if something happens.The morning after, with the car still decorated from the wedding, the men drive into the mountains to go deer hunting. Mike takes hunting very seriously, having expressed his one shot theory to Nick previously, and gives Stan a cold shoulder when Stan wants to borrow socks and then can't find his hunting boots. He asks Mike for his extra pair and Mike refuses, having grown tired of Stan's lack of preparedness on previous trips. Stan in frustration brings out a small handgun he carries and Nick breaks up the confrontation. The next morning, Mike and Nick go out into the woods (Rachmaninoff's dramatic piece "Praise the Name of the Lord" plays on the soundtrack.) Mike has told Nick he is the only one of the group he will hunt with, having no respect for the others. Mike stalks and shoots a deer, bringing it down in a single shot.The troupe returns to Clairton and they go straight to John's bar. John plays a somber piece on the piano and the men sit mostly silent, contemplating their last night together as a group.The scene cuts to a mountainous region of Vietnam where a small village is a battleground. Michael is there, lying unconscious among some dead. A North Vietnamese Army (NVA) soldier walks into the village. He finds a small group of survivors, women and children, hiding in a hidden bunker. He casually arms a grenade, tosses it in and walks off as it explodes. Moments later he sees a woman, badly injured, carrying a baby. The soldier mercilessly shoots her. Mike springs up and blasts the soldier with a flamethrower. As Mike walks around shooting any surviving NVA soldiers, a unit of helicopters arrive and drop troops, among them are Nick and Steve. Mike doesn't seem to recognize them at first when incoming mortar shells from the NVA begin to hit the fields around the village. In the distance,a string of NVA are approaching.The three are captured and held prisoner in a crude riverside prisoner-of-war camp along with other US Army and ARVN prisoners. For entertainment, the guards force their prisoners to play Russian roulette and gamble on the outcome. Steven is suffering a mental breakdown and is chosen first. He pulls the trigger but the gun is aimed above his head, grazing him with the bullet. He is punished by incarceration to a rat infested partially submerge cage. Believing that the experience has broken Steven, Mike considers abandoning him in his planned escape attempt. Nick angrily rejects Mike's idea.Mike, convinces the guards to let him go head-to-head with Nick in the next round, after devising a plan to escape that requires three bullets in the pistol and shares his plan with Nick. Mike tells him to go after the closest gun when Mike makes his move. Mike successfully convinces their captors use three bullets in the cylinder. Mike raises the gun to his head and at the last minute pushes the rifles pointed at him aside while turning the gun on his captors. Mike and Nick grab machine guns and kill the rest and free Steve.The three escape the camp by floating downriver on a tree. An American helicopter patrolling the river attempts to rescue them, but only Nick is able to get inside and the other two hang from the landing gear. The weakened Steven falls into the river. Mike jumps in after him, and helps him to the riverbank. Steven has broken his leg in the fall. Mike carries him on his back to a steam of refugees and convinces the South Vietnamese troops to take Steve on their jeep while he joins the refugees.The psychologically devastated Nick recuperates in a military hospital in Saigon, where the psychologist concludes he is not fit to remain there. After he's released, he tries to call Linda in Clairton but hangs up before the call is connected. He aimlessly wanders in the red light district.Nick encounters Julién Grinda (Pierre Segui), a champagne-drinking Frenchman outside a gambling den where men play Russian roulette for money. Grinda entices Nick to go in. Unbeknown to Nick, Mike is in the crowd, as a spectator. Nick interrupts the match, puts the gun to his head and pulls the trigger and then leaves in a hurry with the Frenchman. Mike follows but can't catch them as they drive away and Nick throws the money the Frenchman offers him into the street.Returning to Clairton Mike avoids a welcome celebration and shows up to meet Linda alone. Nick is still missing, AWOL. Mike finds out that Steve is alive and has returned from Vietnam and visits Angela, Steve's wife, to find out where he is. She is stuck in bed and non-communicative but writes down a number for him. It is the number for Steven's hospital, which is a veteran's rehabilitation clinic.Michael reunites with Steven, who has lost both his legs and the use of an arm plus psychological damage. Steven reveals that someone in Saigon has been mailing large amounts of cash and carved elephants to him. Mike suspects the money is from Nick, who may still be alive and earning the money from Russian roulette gambling. Mike takes Steven home over Steven's protests.The boys go hunting and Mike hunts alone but can't go through with shooting the deer. He has another confrontation with Stan in the hunting cabin after Stan gets mad and aims his pistol at one of them. Mike takes his pistol and throws it away.Mike goes back to Saigon just before its fall in 1975 to find Nick. With the help of the Grinda, he finds Nick in a crowded roulette club, but Nick has no recollection of Mike or his home in Pennsylvania. Make tries to buy Nick from the gamblers. Mike and Nick end up pitted against each other in an attempt on Mike' part to have Nick remember who he is. Mike's attempts to jog his memory and persuade him to come home are unsuccessful and he notices Nick is using drugs. Nick raises the gun and shoots himself in the head.The film ends with Nick's funeral back in America and his friends' response to it. Everyone's there, and even Angela and Steven seem to be on the mend. At the wake in the bar they all sing "God bless America", and toast Nick."CAVATINA" by Stanley Myers is played (on guitar by John Williams) as the credits roll.
Output: Question: Why were Mike and Nick pitted against each other?, Answer: Mike was trying to help Nick remember who he was.