Rent The Deer Hunter on Amazon Video (paid link)
Written by: Michael Cimino & Deric Washburn and Louis Garfinkle & Quinn K. Redeker (story), Deric Washburn (screenplay)
Directed by: Michael Cimino
Starring: Robert De Niro, Christopher Walken, John Cazale, John Savage, Meryl Streep
Rated: R
Watch the trailer
Plot
An in-depth examination of the ways in which the Vietnam War impacts and disrupts the lives of several friends in a small steel mill town in Pennsylvania.
Verdict
This is a rumination about war and how it changes people. We see that through three friends that are headed to Vietnam. Each of them have a different reaction to captivity and war. It changes them markedly and forever.
Watch It.
Review
This film and its success led to Ciminio's next film, Heaven's Gate. It was a storied flop, but the signs were present in this movie with Cimino insisting to shoot on location and out of season which caused a lot of extra production work. This movie went over schedule and the budget doubled. Even the length of this movie was a fight. Cimino got full creative control for Heaven's Gate and he used every bit of it. The failure of Heaven's Gate is cited as a reason the 80s shifted to crowd pleasing blockbusters.
Way back in the day, when I decided to watch every movie on the IMDB Top 250 list, this was the first one I rented. Back then renting was the way to watch movies, imagine.
Three steel workers in a tight knit Slavic community are drafted to fight in Vietnam. In the first few scenes they're shown as young and cavalier. Mike (Robert De Niro) and Nick (Christopher Walken) attend a wedding of a friend before they ship out, contrasting two life altering events. The wedding is the potential of a long future while war could be the end of everything. An hour into the movie, and we're not even out of the wedding. This movie is a bit long.
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| Robert De Niro, Christopher Walken play Mike, Nick |
To defend the length of the movie, part of it is that movies have trained us to want something happening all the time. The first hour with the wedding sets a mood that will contrast with war while letting us hang out with these guys and their families. Then this shifts to Vietnam, starting in media res. Mike, Nick, and Steven (John Savage) are prisoners of war forced to play Russian roulette as entertainment for their captors. It's a terrible situation but Mike is planning an escape.
The movie was criticized for the sadistic portrayal of the Vietnamese captors and game of Russian roulette. There's no proof that such a thing ever happened, but this movie uses that as a symbol. This isn't history, this examines three men's reactions to the senselessness and randomness of violence.
For a movie about Vietnam, we don't spend much time there. We just see a glimpse of the worst for the three guys. Nick ends up at a gambling parlor where he sees Mike watching Russian roulette. The movie doesn't explain anything in this moment. We see these two guys have experienced something horrific, and this scene shows us they haven't overcome it. Seeing people bet on the outcome distresses Nick, causing an outburst. Nick either doesn't care about his life or is delusional about the consequences. Mike was there watching, and that indicates Mike's unresolved issues. We can guess that Mike never would have watched such a thing prior to his experiences.
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| Robert De Niro plays Mike |
Mike returns to the states but avoids his welcome back party. You get it. He doesn't see anything worth celebrating about his time in Vietnam and the friends he lost. If you weren't there, you just don't understand. This movie shows Mike, Nick and Steven before and then after. War has changed them and how they deal, or don't deal with, what happened. Mike goes on a hunting trip with his friends, echoing a scene before he went to Vietnam. Mike can't enjoy hunting like he used to. It dredges up too many memories. When Mike later sees his friends joking with a gun in the cabin, he doesn't take it lightly, nor should he.
This movie explores the harsh realities of war that occur when it's over and you come home. We see the before and after. Nick gambles with his life in a back alley den, Steven hides in the hospital, and Mike might be the most well adjusted of the three, but that's not saying much. He no longer enjoys hunting.
Movies often exemplify the bravery of soldiers in combat, but this looks at the mental toll. It an examination of what's heroic. Making this movie further intriguing is Cimino's flop that immediately followed. You see the signs of that with this movie.
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