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Jarhead

rickvanr

rickvanr

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Apr 10, 2002
3,259
13
Brockville
I went and saw Jarhead on Saturday. I thought it was great. The oil feild scenes were amazing.

Any one else see it? What'd you think about it?
 
maya said:
From the trailers and previews it felt like a recruiting drive, to glamorize the military situation in Iraq. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Like I told my friends, when I see this movie Ill 1) hate war or 2) become really patriotic or 3) enlist in the Marines. I have a feeling it will be option number 2.

And this movie is about the 1991 Persian Gulf war, not the current war in Iraq.

Does anyone else think that Kanye West song fits really, really well into the trailers?
 
I haven't seen it yet though my wife raved about it after a screening she attended. And since it was scored by Thomas Newman and edited by Walter Murch ( the god of all editing...), I know it will be amazing.

BTW, an interesting tidbit my wife learned during the Q and A with Sam Mendes was that any source music ( songs from artists) that he uses in a movie are used in their entirety. If you're into movie scoring or editing, that's a very unique approach.


EDIT: the movie, so I'm told, is anything BUT a recruiting drive...
 
maya said:
From the trailers and previews it felt like a recruiting drive, to glamorize the military situation in Iraq. :rolleyes:
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You mean like Top Gun was in the 80's or whenever that movie came out. ...long...long..time ago.


I hope it's not. I usually hate war/ anti war movies but there are a some that I like.I thought that Jarhead looked actually pretty good and I was planning on to go see it.
 
Jarhead is the Desert Storm equivalent of Full Metal Jacket. The same sense of humor goes through both movies. The main difference, of course, is that warfare has changed considerably in the past 20 years (between the end of Vietnam and the first Gulf War).

Jarhead isn't really an anti-war movie... but it's not pro-war, either.
 
**Mild Spoilers**:









I thought it was ok. I like how it wasn't too too hollywood, seemed to try and be realistic about what that war was like. I thought the whole thing with the sniper freakin out because the air force took his kill was a bit much, and the ending was way rushed. That being said, I say it was still worth seeing.
 
alexstein said:
You mean like Top Gun was in the 80's or whenever that movie came out. ...long...long..time ago.


I hope it's not. I usually hate war/ anti war movies but there are a some that I like.I thought that Jarhead looked actually pretty good and I was planning on to go see it.
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That's right America is always the hero(s) in these movies, or that is what is trying to be brought across via the film makers. :rolleyes:

Whatever happened to peacekeeping? I guess its overrated for the US of A. :rolleyes:
 
clayj said:
Jarhead is the Desert Storm equivalent of Full Metal Jacket. The same sense of humor goes through both movies. The main difference, of course, is that warfare has changed considerably in the past 20 years (between the end of Vietnam and the first Gulf War).

Jarhead isn't really an anti-war movie... but it's not pro-war, either.
Click to expand...

For some reason it comes across as the US is trying to recap wars of history to gain some sort of excuse for the current ones.

Here is an example, I had headed down to an Air Show n the States during the summer (since I like aircrafts, regardless if its military or civilian) and the entire show was basically a recruiting drive. No surprise there, the same old tired speech, yada yada yada... gimme a break. :rolleyes:
 
Jay42, the point of that was they had trained for well over a year or two (Swoff enlisted in '89, and Troy can't have enlisted much earlier than that) to do this ONE thing... they sat in the desert for 6 months, endured all that hell, being rained on by oil, losing girlfriends back home, having to clean out latrines in the desert... and then the ONE opportunity to release was taken away at the very last second by the brass just so they could use their toys (and surely those pilots had seen a LOT of action by that point).

I'd've gone nuts, too.
 
Jay42 said:
**Mild Spoilers**:

I thought it was ok. I like how it wasn't too too hollywood, seemed to try and be realistic about what that war was like. I thought the whole thing with the sniper freakin out because the air force took his kill was a bit much, and the ending was way rushed. That being said, I say it was still worth seeing.
Click to expand...


There is usually never an end to war, many people suffer physicolical issues long after the gun fire has resided. There are also the scares of war that are suffered by both the innocent civilians and military troops on both sides.

However this is much like the States to kick up a storm and leave for something else, leaving other nations to piece things up again. WHat ever happened to fix what you broke (peacekeeping). That word is not in the American Dictionary. I do not hate or dislike America, I do however ask them to be responsible for they actions. :rolleyes:
 
i'm planning to see this. while i'm a dead liberal, anti-war, hippie, i still think this movie looks really good. but that's just me ;)
 
I enjoyed the movie because it is an exploration into how humans deal with relationships and boredom in a tense and stressful yet altogether confusing and foreign environment.

Unfortunately, it's in my head that the Air Force guy IS President Palmer from the '24' series, and it really took me out of it.
 
I saw it Saturday night and thought it was fantastic. Not that patriotic or glamorizing at all.

*Quasi-Spoilers*

I haven't read the book but I wish Swofford/the writers would have touched on the 'Gulf War Syndrome' / PTSD and shown more of Swoff after he got back to the States. The scene where they get back and the 'crazy' Vietnam vet gets on the bus was also odd since nothing became of it.

And to echo Jay42's thought, the ending was way too abrupt.
 
Maya, with all due respect, you do realize we're discussing a movie here right? It does involve war but it's not entirely about war.

There's an entire section of this forum dedicated to discussing your viewpoints about war, the U.S., etc. I think that would be a more appropriate area for you to vent.

And enough with the:rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: 's...
 
3rdpath said:
Maya, with all due respect, you do realize we're discussing a movie here right? It does involve war but it's not entirely about war.
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Indeed, I think that taken at face value it's about a war, but it's not a 'war movie' because there was almost no interaction outside of camp, and roughly zero fighting between opposing troops.

It's a movie about a bunch of guys learning to live in a completely new situation, and there just happens to be a war going on somewhere.
 
Looks prettty good. Focuses more on the people and less on the actual war. Much like the first hour of FMJ...

I definately want to see this movie...
 
maya said:
From the trailers and previews it felt like a recruiting drive, to glamorize the military situation in Iraq. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...
As others have mentioned, it's the exact opposite actually. Join us in the Political Forums to see how I feel about the current war, but based on the reviews (though not a perfect movie, I've heard) we might like it. Only one way to find out, go see it. ;)
 
Jay42 said:
I thought it was ok. I like how it wasn't too too hollywood, seemed to try and be realistic about what that war was like. I thought the whole thing with the sniper freakin out because the air force took his kill was a bit much, and the ending was way rushed. That being said, I say it was still worth seeing.
Click to expand...

Snipers train for years. They are professionals. They can sit in one place for hours, hidden, and take one shot to achieve their goal, then leave. Being a sniper is extremely hard. It isn't a "Well, I got handed the sniper gun today" kind of a thing. Far far different.
 
For some reason, this movie looks like its trying to recruit people. Regardless of what the movie is actually about, it looks like a big fat milti-million dollar attempt at recovering recent shortcomings in the military.

Just listen to the trailer:
Jamie foxx:

"I love this job. I thank God for every day that he gives me in the corps."

:rolleyes:

That being said. I haven't seen the movie. Doesn't seem interesting. But some of the affects to look amazing.
 
I saw this movie, and I thought it was amazing. I didn't think that the ending was too abrupt. Maybe I'm looking to much into it, but I think the ending was a deployment of Brecht's Catharsis. We walk away from it wanting to change things in our own lives. But hey, that's just what I think.

And I think too many people are comparing it to Full Metal Jacket. Even in the theatre, when they were saying the rifle prayer, I hear people behind me bitching about how "they stole that from Full Metal Jacket". Not that big a deal though.

The sniper freaking out was totally earned.

All in all, great movie. And it was beautiful to boot. Some amazing shots all over the place.
 
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