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PLATOON (Pioneer Spec. Ed. Widescreen Laserdisc)

I’ve always been a fan of Oliver Stone’s movies. One of my favorite movies is “JFK”. I loved his previous Vietnam movies “Born On The Fourth Of July” and “Heaven and Earth”, but I never liked his supposed magnum-opus, Platoon. The first and only time I ever watched it was at a rinky-dink cinema back home. I was around 12 or 13 back then. The only thing I really remember about it was that the movie was so dark (literally) and I hated it. Looking back, I probably didn’t like the movie because one, it was over my head and two, I couldn’t really relate to it. I never really liked war movies, not when I was a kid at least. Another reason maybe was that the cinema was just so ugly I couldn’t concentrate on the movie.

Anyway, whatever the reason was, I finally found a reason to come back and watch it via a laserdisc acquired from a fellow lister at the good ol’ HTF. And man, what a treat it was. I practically watched the film for the first time. The story was very deeply moving and characters so real that you felt like you were actually in the war with them. This is the film that put Oliver Stone on the map, and with good reason. Stone was a Vietnam War veteran and his attachment to this movie is so evident that it speaks to you beyond the film.

The cast was also finely chosen. This is one of Charlie Sheen’s most dramatic performances and is the reason that he became a household name (well, before all the sex scandals anyway). Tom Berenger and Willem Dafoe are so effective as enemies that on the same side of the war. Now-superstar Johnny Depp also makes a small appearance in this film (this was one of his first movie roles after leaving the 21 Jumpstreet TV series).

Oh yeah, one other thing to note is that this movie was shot beautifully in the Philippines.

Platoon won well-deserved Oscars for Best Picture and Best Director in 1986 (personally I was rooting for Aliens to win that year), and now I understand why it did. I can name very few movies in the past 20 or so years that have been as memorable as this movie.

Platoon: 4 stars