Platoon (1986) [20th Anniversary Edition] – DVD

The semi-autobiographical epic centres on Pvt. Chris Taylor (Charlie Sheen), a child of privilege who joined the war out of a sense of duty and fairness. Naturally, the grunts he first encounters think that's ridiculous: you don't do pointless and traumatizing things if you don't have to. But Taylor's hero-boy inclinations are destroyed in short order by the dehumanizing grind of the 'Nam–not just from NVA fire but from the American set-up, too. As personified by scar-faced C.O. Sgt. Bob Barnes (Tom Berenger), the raids carried out appear to be senseless: in one such mini-My Lai, villagers are shot more out of pique than out of necessity, and the rancour of the under-pressure soldiers is allowed untrammelled reign. In the midst of all this, the angelic Sgt. Elias Grodin (Willem Dafoe) tries to keep the platoon in the light under Barnes's darkness. Barnes himself will take care of that.

Nothing if not visceral, Stone's film tries to sketch the experience of combat without audience protection. While Coppola may have gotten the glint of metal and Cimino the sentiment of male bonding, it took Stone to provide the image of helicopters blowing the tarp off the American dead and bulldozers pushing VC corpses into mass graves. Platoon's greatest contribution, then, may be in its offering up of not so much as a cover of pride for the bodies of soldiers. Though indestructible Rambo had bullied his way through theatres a year previous, his corrective came swiftly in the form of this elegy to vulnerability, in which nothing–not even the cracking wise and verbal sparring that is part and parcel of male genres–can protect them. One thinks to the subsequent bullet-proof/bullet-ridden men of Tarantino and realizes that Stone puts the lie to his eloquent obscenity as a means of control when all else fails.

I find myself with nagging doubts, such as whether to dock Platoon half a star for its sentimentality. Lost youth is referenced early on with a quote from Ecclesiastes, and Stone can't quite manage to enter adulthood. He needs the good father/bad father dichotomy of Elias and Barnes, choosing to worship mentors instead of defining his own path–a problem that will come back to haunt his oeuvre. His need for external reasoning also leads him into a long-standing criticism of the Vietnam genre: that it focuses on the "crazy" element of being in the shit in lieu of pondering the hows/whys/ifs of the conflict. Stone is clearly on the left-wing side (he points out the lower classes shouldering the burdens that the elite can avoid), yet one could come away thinking the war was the slaughter of innocents or chastened at the heroic "sacrifice." That Platoon is a big hit with military viewers despite the director's demurrals tells you everything you need to know about the efficacy of its protest.

Still, against-the-grain readings aside, I can't bring myself to blow off this movie. It seemed for one brief, shining moment that Stone might have the politics and the perspective to push through a formalist left-wing cinema–and one looks at the shrill cartoons of later years and shakes one's head. Platoon, as Stone puts it in the special features of the current DVD release, is a warning to those who would "buy somebody else's used war," not the silly appeals to primordial Kennedys and Byronic rock stars as he slid into hopeless (if entertaining) camp. Platoon is the work of someone ambitious enough to go for the grand gesture but laid low enough to maintain a sense of proportion. The fact that he disappeared into ego and silliness is one of the sad stories in recent American film.

THE DVD
To commemorate its 20th anniversary, MGM reissues Platoon yet again on DVD, and the umpteenth time's the charm. The definitive 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer boasts exquisite detail, especially considering the film's limited palette of muddy greens and browns, which have a tendency to look crushed on the format. Saturation is deep and similarly lustrous. Dolby 5.1 and DTS remixes also grace the disc, the former a creditable but predictable combination of audio elements with some fairly creative use of the rear channels, the latter magnificently unpredictable. If the speaker assignments are a tad berserk, we're also talking about a movie where sounds jump at you from every direction; and with its increased transparency, the DTS option at least manages to capture the aural experience of combat, with a scene in front of a waterfall that'll give you chills. This "2-Disc DVD Collector's Set"'s extras break down as follows:

DISC ONE

Commentary with Oliver Stone
In mellifluous tones, the filmmaker points out a few things we already know (such as the autobiographical resonances) and truncates explanations of a few things we don't (such as various technical details). That said, he's less halting and more forthcoming than most yak-track veterans, revealing in succession that a Filipino crewmember died in an accident and that some of the Vietnamese cast members are tourists on vacation in the Philippines.

Commentary with Dale Dye
The film's military technical advisor (and 30-month Vietnam vet) surprises with a commentary that's more about how things shook down on set than about what is true in Platoon to the experience of combat. He's unstinting in his praise for the actors, discussing how their two weeks of basic training prepared them; he likewise offers more film-related anecdotes than Stone does.

DISC TWO

Deleted and Extended Scenes
There aren't too many surprises among these 11 clips (with optional commentary from Stone): they're mostly dialogue scenes that were obviously cut because they slowed down the action. Nevertheless, one is happy to see the Night of the Hunter reference in one grunt's LOVE/HATE tattoos, as well as an alternative denouement in which Chris lets Barnes live.

"Snapshot in Time: 1967-1968" (19 mins.)
A brief intro to the times in which Platoon takes place, not just the Tet Offensive and the turning of the war, but the painful series of disasters (King and Kennedy assassinations, LBJ's abdication) that impacted them as well. It's a disturbing clip, first for the anguished vision of the times, then for the hawkish claims it makes that the war was winnable if not for the lack of will.

"Creating the 'Nam" (12 mins.)
On the production of the film: Charlie Sheen reports that Stone was a demanding button-pusher, "but he was the first to admit it." Meanwhile, editor Claire Simpson reports one of her big contributions: the famous use of Samuel Barber over the village massacre scene. No bombshells otherwise.

"Raw Wounds: The Legacy of Platoon" (17 mins.)
This remembers the film's reception a little differently than I did: what seemed to me like a letting go and an indictment of authority is here portrayed as the second coming of Robert McNamara. Stone's remarks suggest heavy downplaying (he had just done Salvador, for chrissakes), and a bit of navel-gazing goes on with regards to how Platoon's about the war at home between hawks and doves.

"One War, Many Stories" (25 mins.)
Here, Stone's reminiscences are intercut with those of a group of veterans who've just watched the movie. Although Stone is far more critical, one can't help but be moved by people who've been through hell and back on the thinnest of pretexts.

"Tour of the Inferno" (53 mins.)
The centrepiece of the extras disc: a truly outstanding retrospective from Stone's regular documentarian Charles Kiselyak that puts many such featurettes to shame. What has been merely alluded to in the rest of the features (the harsh conditions, the boot-camp training, Stone's intransigence) is thrust in your face through not only cast interviews (Sheen, Dafoe, Berenger, John C. McGinley, Forest Whitaker, and Johnny Depp) but also the deft use of combat stock footage and on-set video. The model of what a making-of should be.

"Preparing for 'Nam" (6 mins.)
A brief intro to the prospect of basic training: various veterans describe the experience of getting stripped of their individuality and thrown in with people they never thought they'd meet. No Full Metal Jacket horrors, ultimately.

A photo gallery, the trailer, three TV spots, and trailers for The Great Escape, Windtalkers (Director's Cut), The Patriot (Extended Cut), Raging Bull (Collector's Edition), Black Hawk Down (Extended Cut), "The Best of WWII Movies", and the James Bond Ultimate Collection round out the platter.

120 minutes; R; 1.85:1 (16×9-enhanced); English DD 5.1, English DTS 5.1, French Dolby Surround, Spanish DD 2.0 (Stereo); CC; English, French, Spanish subtitles; 2 DVD-9s; Region One; MGM