| Overall Grade: |
A+ |
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| Story: |
A+ |
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| Acting: |
A+ |
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| Direction: |
A |
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| Visuals: |
A |
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Born On The Fourth Of July review
by Yahoo! Movies User (movies profile)
Jul 21, 2007
12
of
13 people found this review helpful
This is the best film made about Vietnam. Apocalypse Now is surrealism and pot. The Deer Hunter has questionable historical accuracy(very few POWs were made to do Russian Roulette) and Platoon rivals Born On The Fourth Of July but does not come close because Born covers both the war and what happens to the men who fought in it after they came home. The film opens in a Long Island Town where Ron Kovic grew up. He wrestled at his high school and one scene has Tom Barenger(Barnes in Platoon) coming in as a Marine. Kovic who has been raised on John Wayne movies and the romantic view of war signs up with the Marines to serve in Vietnam. Stone shows us different geography because he shows a beach and sand Vietnam. Kovic helps take a village and while he is on a sand dune shootng at the enemy he is blinded by the sun and accidently shoots and kills a soldier. Kovic gets shot and he is taken out of the war and to a Bronx veterans hospital. Some of the best scenes in the film are in the hospital with Cruise as Kovic upside down staring at his own vomit and cursing and asking to be treated with dignity. Kovic goes home in a wheel chair and he fights with his brother who is against the war. Kovic rides in a car in a parade. The sounds of cap guns give him mental pain. He gets in a fight with his mother and travels to Mexico. Kovic meets other Vietnam veterans. He is going on a downward spiral of beer and sex. One of the scenes has the prostitute realizing Kovic cannot have sex and she laughs at him. Kovic ends up in the desert with another vet played by William Dafoe. They scream at each other and wrestle out of their wheel chairs. Kovic leaves Mexico and goes to Georgia to confess to the parents of the soldier that he accidently shot him. He goes to th 1972 Miami Republican Convention and is assaulted along with fellow protestors by police as they scream at Nixon. The film ends with Kovic rolling his wheel chair to the stage in the 1976 democrat convention to a standing ovation. The film should have won best actor for cruise. |
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