Opening Scene & GySgt Hartman’s “Motivational Speech”

The opening scene of Full Metal Jacket starts off with the new inductees of the United States Marine Corps getting their military haircut. This gets rid of the idea of them being an “individual”. They are given the same uniform, same haircut, and the same rifle. They live in the same room with the same linen. There is no place for them to be an individual. While getting their haircut Joker and Pyle have a smirk on their face which made me think that they were going to be key characters in the film because everyone else had a somewhat mad look. The movie progresses to Gunnery Sergeant Hartman giving his “motivational speech”. At the beginning the camera shows all of the recruits. If you take a closer look you will notice that the position of Pyle, Cowboy, and Joker changes. It’s not something you could actually notice the first time because the recruits all look the same. GySgt Hartman starts his speech by telling the recruits how they will address him and what they’ll be if and only if they survive his training. Immediately afterwards Hartman starts to dehumanize them by calling them things such as “the lowest form of life on Earth” and “pieces of amphibian shit”. Hartman goes on to tell them that they won’t like him because he is hard but tells them that “the more you hate me, the more you will learn.” He then starts to yell, belittle, and abuse Snowball, Joker, Cowboy, and Pyle. Once he gets to Pyle he loses his cool because Pyle can’t get the smirk off of his face. He then begins to choke him. This is where I see that Pyle is going to be little different than the rest of the recruits. The director does a very good job doing subtle gestures that may hint that something is to come.