A Tale of Two Tyrants

Stanley Kubrick and Oliver Stone present two distinct pictures of the American military tyrant who, they would seem to argue, is to be blamed for some of the messier aspects of America’s involvement in the Vietnam War. In Full Metal Jacket, Gunner Sergeant Hartman is a cold, calculating human cog in a well-oiled war machine- perhaps even a philosopher, in his personal life. In Platoon, we encounter Staff Sergeant Barnes, who is a primal, bloodthirsty animal.

In the opening scene of Full Metal Jacket (following the credits), the audience is given an inside view of GySgt Hartman, as he cordially welcomes a platoon of new recruits into the United States Marine Corps. This scene takes place in a barracks bay at the Parris Island recruit training depot. The camera follows GySgt Hartman from a slight distance as he strolls around the perimeter of the bay in an erect posture, one arm folded rigidly behind his back. None of the fluorescent ceiling lights are turned on at this time; daylight pours in through windows behind the bunks to expose the clean, perfectly ordered interior of the bay, in which even the ceilings appear to have been freshly shined. Hartman chirps his (hilarious,) obscenity-laden poetry with unwavering clarity, like a machine; his fastidiously arranged exterior loses none of its composition even when he punches one recruit and strangles another (seriously injuring neither). In this sterile world of ninety degree angles and perfectly-recited peroration in which Kubrick depicts his tyrant, ideas dominate. Everything in the room represents the manifestation of a clear, purposeful idea. Hartman forces his ideas of what a Marine should be upon a room full of young men whose lives may have been, until recently, as diverse as their pre-training hairstyles. We are never even the slightest hint as to what Gunnery Sergeant Hartman’s “real self” might be like- he is merely a walking projection of such ideas as blind force, surrender of personality and critical thought in service of the greater good, and a black and white/win or lose approach to conflict. And though Hartman is killed stateside, the graduates of his last platoon carry his ideas with them to Vietnam.

In Platoon, we get our closest look at Oliver Stone's tyrant, an infantry platoon sergeant on the line named Staff Sergeant Barnes, in the scene in which he confronts a group of his soldiers as they are smoking pot and weaving idle plots to kill him, shortly after Barnes has murdered one of his squad leaders, Sergeant Elias. In this scene, SSG Barnes presents a very different picture from that of Gunnery Sergeant Hartman on Parris Island. After hearing Barnes smugly ask his soldiers if they are “talking ‘bout killing,” we see Barnes, slumped casually against sand bags, in the partially lit entrance of the dank, cluttered bunker in which the plotting soldiers are assembled. A load-bearing equipment vest adorns his otherwise naked chest; he exhales cigarette smoke with a hiss before taking a sip from the fifth of J.D. he is packing- half of which never makes it into his mouth. Barnes does not demand to know the identity of the “slimy little communist shit twinkle-toed cocksucker down here, who just signed his own death warrant.” He makes no attempt to quickly and decisively restore order to the situation; for that matter, his own appearance is every bit as disordered as that of his stoner soldiers. Rather, he seems almost entertained to hear his subordinates talking about murdering him. Ultimately, the brute force of Barnes’ will wins out over the frustrated angst of the junior enlisted soldiers. However, it is not the idea of force, as a necessary element within the inherently violent construct of military engagements (etc), which he asserts upon the group, but the messy, gray-area-permeated “reality” (…Pynchon shout-out there) of his own force.

Hartman robs poor, innocent young men of their individual identities; and in the place previously occupied by their personalities, he implants his own ideas of heartlessness, thoughtless obedience, and team spirit on steroids. His very existence seems to echo the mantra of such Vietnam-era generals as Westmoreland and Lemay: with enough bombs in the air and boots on the ground, the American military can resolve any violent situation. Barnes does not bother much with ideas. Like a seething tiger, he stalks the jungles and villages of Vietnam, devouring anyone who gets in his way- civilian or combatant, friend or foe. Stone would like to inform us that it is Staff Sergeant Barnes whom we should thank for the massacre at My Lai and for the less-than-rare incidents of "fragging" later in the war.