"Platoon" A masterpiece of war movies created by recreating "self" in Vietnam *Note! Contains spoilers.

*This article touches on the ending of the story, so we recommend watching the movie before reading it.

"Platoon" synopsis

In 1967, a young volunteer named Chris arrives in Vietnam during a fierce battle. Angered by the conscription of ethnic minorities and poor people, he dropped out of a prestigious university and volunteered to go to Vietnam. However, what awaited him when he was suddenly assigned to the front-line platoon ``Platoon'' was the harsh reality of war far beyond his imagination. A battle against murder in the name of war, suspicion and hatred, and loss of humanity... Amidst the fear of death on the front lines, he soon experiences the madness and reality of war, including the massacre, pillage, and rape of Vietnamese people.

Index

• A never-before-seen Vietnam War movie made from a “ground-level perspective”
• A special camp to “reenact” Vietnamese soldiers
• The series of setbacks that brought Oliver Stone to Vietnam
• Two superior officers who embody "good" and "evil" in their hearts.

A never-before-seen Vietnam War movie made from a “ground-level perspective”

In December 1986, Platoon was quietly released in just six theaters in New York, Los Angeles, and Toronto. The film, made on a budget of just $6 million (half the average Hollywood movie budget at the time), featured no Big stars or even women, and was considered a failure by its distributors. However, in New York, people lined up at movie theaters from the first day of release, setting a new record for box office sales in a single week. The film was quickly released across the United States and grossed $130 million in the United States alone, more than 20 times the production cost.

Furthermore, ``Platoon'' won four major Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director, making director Oliver Stone's name known to the world. Perhaps the most accurate tribute to this film is an article in the Los Angeles Times. ``Compared to this film, even the best war movies of the past look like they were filmed from a distance with awkward crane shots... Platoon is a film shot at zero meters above the ground.''

There are many works depicting the Vietnam War before ``Platoon.'' `` Apocalypse Now '' (79), `` The Deer Hunter '' (78), and `` Homecoming '' (78). Furthermore, `` Rambo '' (1982) can also be considered a Vietnam movie in that it depicts a soldier suffering from the aftereffects of the Vietnam War. While these works depicted fragmentary, sometimes dramatic dramatizations of what was happening on the battlefields of Vietnam, Platoon took a completely different approach.

"Platoon" preview

Stone fought as a soldier on the Vietnam battlefield for 1 year and 5 months starting in 1967. Although ``Platoon'' is a feature film, most of the battles and episodes depicted in it are almost exactly the same as those he experienced on the battlefield. In other words, the film is a reportage of the battlefield as seen by one soldier.

Looking back on those days, Stone says: "I saw people die. I killed people. I almost got killed. ...Maybe I was scooped up for some reason. Something... Maybe to write about this experience. Maybe to make a movie out of this experience."

After returning from Vietnam, Stone studied film at university and began writing screenplays. In 1976, he finally started working on ``Platoon'' and completed the scenario in just three weeks. "I wrote this scenario as straight as I can remember."

However, the script was rejected by every film company. In 1976, it was still more than a year since the end of the Vietnam War, and the bitterness of America's first defeat in history was still fresh among people. However, in the 1980s, the trend changed. As the aforementioned Vietnamese films were actively produced, the production of ``Platoon'' was also given the go Signs. Ten years after writing the script, filming has finally begun.

A special camp to “reenact” Vietnamese soldiers