BORN ON THE FOURTH OF JULY (1989)
2.5/5
Review by John Ulmer (http://www.rottentomatoes.com/author-6769)
"Born on the Fourth of July" forms the conclusion of Oliver Stone's
so-called "Vietnam Trilogy," also comprised of "Platoon" and.
Although it starts out very good, Stone's film soon begins to wander
helplessly – and features a tiring and overwhelming anti-war message
at its core that ruins the movie itself.
I believe that "Platoon" is the greatest war film ever made, and
although it has a heavy anti-war cloud above its head, it's still a
terrific film because the message never becomes overbearing.
The propaganda here takes away from the storytelling – it is as if
Stone is using the story of Ron Kovic to simply bombard us with images
and ideas and, let's be frank, occasional utter lies. "Platoon" this
is not.
The story opens in the 1950s, with a young Kovic, and sets up his
rather clichéd existence: naïve happy family, warm small-town
community, and generally innocent surroundings. (It couldn't have all
really been so peachy, could it?)
As a teenager (now played by Tom Cruise) Kovic is enticed to join the
Marines, and is enlisted in the Vietnam War, where he is permanently
crippled (his legs become useless and – for lack of a better
description – his most fragile area is shattered).
Kovic is sent back home and, at first, pretends that everything is all
right – but it isn't. He's soon swearing at his parents, breaking down
in tears, yelling about the horrific images he witnessed in Vietnam,
cursing America – all this leading to his own self-destruction.
Kovic's story is a true one, but it is also greatly exaggerated by
Stone with his use of factual inaccuracies and manipulation of truth.
Cruise's performance is one of his finest (and he was nominated for
Best Actor in 1989), but both he and Stone try too hard – they take a
good story and turn it into an overwhelming anti-war propaganda piece.
The movie feels like it has no purpose – as if Stone is using it as an
excuse to bombard us with more of his theories about warfare and how
wrong it is.
War is wrong. But we can't ignore it. A movie such as "Born on the
Fourth of July" takes a stab at a specific event in America's past,
shaming the veterans (Kovic included) through its ignorant and naïve
outlook. Stone spends so much time trying to convince us why Vietnam
was a blunder, and why it was a disgrace, and why it was a horrible
decision, and why Republicans are idiots (check out the grand finale
outside the Republican National Convention), and why Kovic's fight for
"the truth" is honorable, that he forgets to honor the vets
themselves. He manipulates his audience to an extreme, using a bundle
of tried-and-used film clichés to setup the Kovic character in the
film. I have family members that were mentally scarred by Vietnam, but
to pretend that anyone was 100% perfect before the war is silly – and
Stone's use of this technique is just his own way of forcing us to
feel sympathy for a shallow version of Kovic.
Vietnam was a mistake but let's not pretend that those who fought and
gave their lives were pointless and useless. They deserve respect,
even if the war itself doesn't – and Stone fails to realize this,
making his movie an embarrassing propaganda piece without a point.
========== X-RAMR-ID: 38407 X-Language: en X-RT-ReviewID: 1303664 X-RT-TitleID: 1028555 X-RT-SourceID: 1382 X-RT-AuthorID: 6769 X-RT-RatingText: 2.5/5
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