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After reading Michael Herr’s article “Hell Sucks’, watching Apocalypse Now and the clip from the Ken Burns documentary Vietnam, address how each of these presentations articulates the experience of soldiers sent to war. Are these narratives effective in enabling a better understanding of the conflict? Be concise in explaining your answer. (200 words maximum)
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Apocalypse Now and the writing of Michael Herr use different narratives to depict the horrible and traumatic experiences of those in Vietnam. The film focuses on the mental stress and outward trauma the war brought on Captain Willard and Colonel Kurtz. The opening scene of Captain Willard suffering a mental breakdown in the confines of a Saigon lodge sets the overall tone regarding the insanity of how it feels to be in war which coincides with the intense scenes of bloodshed later in the film. The film’s outward and obvious depiction of the trauma caused by war is a contrast to the subtler work of Herr. He is focused on mundane scenes, such as conversing with a general late at night, or taking refuge with soldiers in an abandoned grand villa. For Herr, the war is more about the slow and covert ways it changed people, as opposed to the outward and blunt situations of Apocalypse Now. Each effort is effective in portraying the depression and damage the war caused, although it is necessary to point out that Apocalypse Now seemed to at times embellish situations in order to make the visuals more impressive and cinematic as opposed to realistic.
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Each of these three sources contribute to a better understanding of the Vietnam War. Michael Herr describes the deeply destructive nature of the Vietnam war. The war destroyed in the sense that it devalued what it came into contact with: it treated people, places, and a nation with less dignity than deserved. Herr writes, “There has been no country here but the war. The landscape has been converted to terrain, the geography broken down into its more useful components…positions, objectives, fields of fire.” The treated Vietnam, and all it encompassed, as something lesser.
Ken Burns’ documentary also has the benefit of being a primary source. It helps by going directly to the war and letting it speak for itself–accounts from real soldiers and footage straight from the action helps to bring viewers close to what actually occurred in Vietnam, and how it felt to be there.
Apocalypse Now’s immediate contribution is another look into the action itself–the violence and chaos of Vietnam. It is most helpful, however, in its illustration of the psychological effects of war and violence. The film’s character portraits, especially those of Kurtz and Willard, show the madness that can result from such intensity and destruction. -
All of these sources emphasize a common theme, that the war in Vietnam lacked a strong moral justification and led to senseless violence that traumatized everyone involved. In Vietnam, Herr observed a the hopelessness of the soldiers. One of them lamented that “it is awful, just plain awful, awful without relief.” Although war is rarely described as anything but awful, it is surprising how few soldiers saw any moral justification or purpose to the war to counterbalance that awfulness. No one seems to think the war is worth the costs, yet everyone continues onward. Indeed, Herr notes that the war apparatus built by the United States “can do almost everything but stop.”
Another result of the war is the dissonance that the amoral war created. The film Apocalypse Now embodies this confusion. Characters frequently encounter denials of reality, such as when one military officer tells the protagonist that his “mission never happened” or when a character acknowledges that the U.S. denies any involvement in Cambodia but must go there anyway. The film is littered with such examples of characters being forced to reconcile their reality with official statements and postures that do not concur with their experience. -
From these three separate narratives, the Vietnam War is described as utter destruction and extreme violence. These soldiers have truly gone through hell, over and over again as they go up and down the rivers and jungles of Vietnam. Thousands of young men, some barely 17, faced and fought through the horrors of a war that had become a convoluted political disarray. In Apocalypse Now, Captain Williard’s reaction to his mission of killing Colonel Kurtz — “charging a man with murder in this place was like handing out speeding tickets at the Indy 500” — shows just how unclear what was and wasn’t moral. Michael Herr describes some soldiers as not even batting an eye at the sight of slaughtered Vietnamese, but would vomit if they saw a cleanly killed American soldier. To stomach a war like this, dehumanization was necessary to continue. The documentary clip showed how vivid and intense the memories of war were for the soldiers. They were so young and, if they were fortunate enough to make it home, had to live with the aftermath of a life-altering devastation the rest of their lives.
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While reading a history textbook, it is easy to just learn the facts of a war and forget about the effect on individuals fighting the war. However, when reading “Hell Sucks” and watching Vietnam and Apocalypse Now, it is impossible to overlook the emotional toll. These sources give a little glimpse into the psychological effects on those fighting or participating in the war in some capacity. Over the course of Apocalypse Now, the effects of the war are clearly seen. Chef has a breakdown after running from a tiger, exclaiming “I didn’t come here for this.” No one fighting in Vietnam expected the war to be as brutal, savage, and violent as it was. Each member of Willard’s seems to be affected in some way, whether it is becoming disillusioned with the war or just seemingly going crazy. The men who were involved in the war were faced with unimaginable horrors while fighting in a war many did not see a reason for or end to. To survive the war unscathed, the soldiers basically needed to become immune to death and destruction. Many did to some degree, as Herr discusses with soldiers being unaffected by the death of Vietnamese. However, as can clearly be seen in the personal stories in Vietnam, no soldier could completely become immune to death and will forever be affected by the horrific violence they saw and participated in.
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These three portrayals work well together to illustrate the detrimental effects of the Vietnam War on soldiers. While both the Burns documentary and Herr’s work presented factual/anecdotal evidence to portray soldiers’ struggle to cope with the violence and destruction of Vietnam, Apocalypse Now primarily critiqued the immorality of American involvement and how that affected soldiers through fiction.
Herr’s work best described the bleakness of the war in his descriptions of scenes of decaying victims, for example the hospital scene. Burns’ work also shows the suffering endured and mental ramifications of the war, evident even years later. He also supplies useful historical context.
As a fictionalized account of the war, Apocalypse Now employed fictionalized accounts, often bordering on absurdity, to convey its themes. Throughout the movie the soldiers’ suffering is clear as they face disturbing situations and painful losses along each stretch of the river. The illustration of the mental toll the war took on soldiers however cumulates in Kurtz. As he utters “the horror the horror” as his dying declaration, he alludes to the immorality of the American role in Vietnam (echoing Heart of Darkness’s critique of imperialism) as what drove him to his breaking point. He serves as an extreme illustration soldiers’ mental state. -
Burns, Coppola, and Herr all collectively deal with the trauma, hopelessness, and struggle of the Vietnam war. However, they each condemn the war in their own way. When looked at together, a strong and powerful narrative is developed. Herr discusses the war in his writing on a large scale, he takes careful detail in describing the number of dead he encountered to convey the equal scale of devastation. Coppola, in his film, conveys feelings of personal descent into madness. As the characters progress upriver, their joy and calmness are quickly turned into trauma and suffering until they are either dead or gone near insane. Burns differs from Herr and Coppola in that he deals with memory. By interviewing veterans decades after the conflict has ended, Burns shows how veterans’ trauma never leaves them. In the interview with the Marine recounting his experience being shot and nearly left for dead, the man begins his story with a smile, one of nostalgia or pride. His expression quickly turns as he continues, however. He is nearly brought to tears as his near-death experience. These three men create an effective narrative of the large-scale, personal, and lasting trauma of Vietnam.
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Similarly to any story/event, there are different perspectives, interpretations, and overall experiences varying between each individual. The Vietnam War is no exception. While the three narratives show a different angle, they enable a better understanding of the conflict in a more personal light; sharing the theme of environmental circumstances altering the human mind and actions. Notably, the Vietnam War became so intense and brutal that those involved became almost barbaric, only reverting back to their true selves moments at a time—if ever.
Nonetheless, there were many factors that played into this. In “Hell Sucks”, Herr mentions the inadequate leadership and command being made which extended into hopelessness and being put into unnecessary situations such as attacks and the constant surrounding of death. The soldiers felt as though there was no end nor gain which damaged their mental health. It is evident in Apocalypse Now throughout their casts: Chef with the tiger incident, Willard with his undying quest to assassinate Kurt, the comfort found in drugs, alcohol, women, and killing, and many more. In Burn’s documentary, Vietnam, true emotions were exposed as the interviewee mentioned how the other members dragged and covered him on the battlefield as he was on the brink of death. Although the soldiers embodied the value of teamwork by leaving no man behind, sacrifices were made by simply being there. Experiences like these were forcibly desensitized and changed characters.
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One of the unifying themes for the American soldier in Vietnam according to these sources is the realization that death is familiar to their experience in war – this of course arriving from the presupposition that the industry of war is ultimately death.
In the Ken Burns documentary, we see one of these relationships with death in the form of acceptance, perhaps in the face of overwhelming futility; we can begin to hear (and perhaps not completely understand) the thoughts of a man who had accepted his death after being triaged as a lost cause.
In Apocalypse Now, the whole surfing subplot demonstrates another relationship with death, one of complete detachment from the concept either through voluntary replacement of the atmosphere of war with an illusion of R&R – or through the deconstruction of the natural human fear of death by way of insanity.
Lastly, in Michael Herr’s article, among his many anecdotes stood out the remembrance of the “lidded container” Vietnamese soldier whose visage had haunted Michael. This image and the associated fear that Michael felt towards this presentation of death represents the visceral and human reaction to death and its proximity that was likely rampant in the ranks of American soldiers.
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Many accounts of the Vietnam War show confusion and brutality. Soldiers did not know what they were fighting for or why they were fighting; all they knew were the orders the higher ups commanded and that they must complete those orders. “Apocalypse Now” focused heavily on the theme of insanity, and shows the feeling of being stuck in something greater than yourself, and being forced to perform actions without really knowing the purpose and the significance. The documentary in Vietnam brought a real, personal experience to the table and showed the tremendous fear and futility for soldiers at the frontline. Even if they knew what they faced was great danger and almost certain death, they had to charge for nothing more than numbers to send back to Washington–body counts that were meaningless but to propaganda papers. “Hell Sucks” shows a similar story, showing soldiers unwillingly thrown into a war that they themselves did not believe in, fighting only for the sake of duty, because someone higher up decided they had to fight, and so they fought. All accounts illustrate the lack of a cause for fighting–rather, everything was senseless, confusing, and insane.
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The documentary, the article by Michael Herr, and Apocalypse Now all feature soldiers who fought in Vietnam. The documentary that interviewed surviving soldiers emphasized PTSD, the after effects of the war, and the comradely and duty soldiers felt among and to one another. One man spoke about a time several of his team were shot – and presumably killed – trying to save him when he was fatally wounded. The Article also emphasized comradely and duty but its informal style and variety of narratives gave a more complete, candid perspective on what went down on the ground. The movie revolved around a deranged officer, and much of the movie is unexplained, most likely to showcase the absurd and unprepared nature of the war and the soldiers. All the sources barely mention the Vietnamese people. Last semester Viet Nguyen, the author of the Sympathizer and a refugee from Vietnam, came to BC and spoke about the first time he watched Apocalypse Now. The so-called Vietnamese characters, if they were featured saying anything, weren’t even speaking in Vietnamese. The article highlights a quote by a soldier who couldn’t bare the sight of dead Americans but didn’t blink an eye when a Vietnamese was brutally slaughtered.
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Michael Herr’s article and the film showcase the damaging effect of the war on the soldiers. The facade as “soldier-tourists” peels away with the increasing bloodshed, decreasing morality, and swelling homesickness. In “Hell Sucks”, Herr notes the impending doom upon the soldiers as he equates the battles to the announcement of the Titanic hitting the iceberg. He continually asks the reason for the soldiers to stay and later for himself. Most soldiers, after the incredible loss of lives during the battle, believe they will not survive and only desire to become wounded in order to be sent home. While the major stubbornly believes in winning, the soldiers and the first lieutenant doubt these claims. Herr blurs the line between the soldiers in battle and the dying as he explains, “Outside the operating rooms, there were all of those who were beyond saving already going grey before death. They just waited there, and you could see they know”. These soldiers accepted death and died in spirit of what they have known and been before the war. Similar to the realization felt after the Battle for Hue, the death of the soldier Bomber breaks the last straw for the troops. The haunting sound of his family’s letter asking for his safe return home during his death scene shocks his fellow battalion members. His friend wails at his death while the others quietly, shockingly watch. No longer tourists in the country, the soldiers showcase the dread and bitterness felt by the chaplain in Herr’s battalion.
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All the sources are effective in depicting the dread of the soldiers living in the war, who often faced the chaos without a strong feeling of moral certitude of what they were doing. This is one of the most important issues addressed. However, also interesting to note, is that the experience of the soldiers is frequently marked by a very close presence of the press. In Ken Burns’ documentary, military pilot John McCain is interviewed soon after being kidnapped. Journalist Michael Herr was very close to the military personnel and action for long periods. He even developed close relationships with the marines and soldiers, being by their side while they traveled, fought, hid, slept, etc. In Apocalypse Now, some journalists who were filming while missiles exploded and houses were on fire asked the soldiers: “Don’t look at the camera! It’s the television. Just go by like you’re fighting!” Such super-close documenting of the action, which is far less common today, certainly enables a better understanding of the war for the public and was important in giving rise to the anti-war movements.
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“Hell Sucks,’ Apocalypse Now, and Vietnam all attempt to understand the turmoil of a war built on menacing government power and patriotism with none of its promised results.
Herr’s “Hell Sucks,” highlights the destructive aspects of war, describing dead bodies, and their lost voices through the words they scribbled on their surroundings. The destruction also exists within the minds of people he describes, those who have decayed into something not-human due to their inability to see humanity in the Vietnamese. Herr paints the war as marked by misplaced rage meeting ignorance.
Apocalypse Now opens in a dazed manner, showing Willard’s face as a mirage among sunsets, palm trees and Vietnam war scenes. Immediately, the viewer is clued into the inescapability of the war within the minds of those who have seen it. The movie then portrays youthful playfulness among fatal and inhumane mistakes. The viewer watches the psychological grip of the war on individuals while displaying war’s uselessness.
Vietnam has a more factually-based narrative to it, paired with personal stories, making it clear the the war was objectively marked by confusion and the ringing in of a new era of empowerment and rebellion against status quo. -
The three presentations of the soldiers’ experiences of the Vietnam War, whether intentionally or not, all show the degree of human folly and the incredible and uncontrollable level of the war’s situations. The complexity of the war was conditioned by the US government who dictated the devastation of the lands of Indochina from far away. Although the depictions of the Vietnam experiences carefully showed the pro and anti-war contradictions and the personalized and traumatized stories of the American soldiers, I don’t think that they are enough compelling in conveying the circumstances of the conflict. For the least, the narratives entirely left out the representation of the Vietnamese side. While the American soldiers later suffer through PTSD and the humiliation of fighting and then losing a war of nonsense, the Vietnamese, whether they are the Viet Cong or the South Vietnamese, or just civilians living on the land, are not given a voice in their Americancentric narrative. I think that it is important to understand the other side of the story in order to fully and more capably study this troubling history where different perspectives proposed different kinds of narratives.
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Both the article and film seemed to examine the war through an odyssey with the experience of soldiers just unfolding. There was a sense of motion in both works, and an objective eye capturing an unfiltered look at real events as they took place, but even still there remains a subjective element in the fact that the article was told from the narration of a correspondent and the film directed and orchestrated by others. One underlying thread that disturbed me in both works was a sense of disorientation. The odyssey that the film and article capture feels aimless and strange; there is no clear sense of where or why the camera or Herr were going, but they did. Everything continued to move, carried forward by an obscure, dreadful force similar to Kafka’s stories. The content of both the article and film, what I read and saw, made no sense whatsoever. It fault as though I was being traumatized and the burden of making sense of things was placed on me. The more I watched or read, the more taxing and difficult it became to bring myself to a meaningful understanding of what it is I had just consumed. In that sense, it seems both works were equally successful in conveying an authentic glimpse into the experience of a soldier at war. Furthermore, both works powerfully convey a similar understanding of war, but one that is characterized by misunderstanding and incomprehension.
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Ken Burns’ documentary, Michael Herr’s article “Hell Sucks”, and the film Apocalypse Now each successfully and uniquely articulate the experiences of soldiers sent to war. Burns offers personal testimony; survivors of Vietnam relay the past and present traumas of war in a conversational manner. The viewer can put a face to the action in a way that history books may not be able to. Similarly, Herr offers readers a profoundly personal account of soldiers’ lives in the war zone. He effectively relays how destructive the war “machine” has embedded itself deep into both the public eye and into the soldiers’ psyches. Many people brashly (and mistakenly) dismiss the catastrophic consequences of our war efforts: deeming involvement necessary and normal. Herr paints those soldiers who have been indoctrinated into believing their efforts are needed and justified as victims; juxtaposed directly with our typical portrayal of soldiers as heroes. This leaves the reader sympathetic and pitiful for all those affected by the physical and mental destruction created by our war machine. Apocalypse Now offers a visual portrayal of the points Herr makes. It displays the gruesome action that took place in Vietnam, and analogously conveys the deterioration of the soldier’s mental states. The deaths of war are certainly horrible, but this approach shows the viewer that living through war is arguably even worse; given the everlasting impact inhumane violence has on the psyche.
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All three source provide different perspectives into the realities of the Vietnam war, from the destruction, to the desolation. In both Apocalypse Now and in the documentary you are hit with the visual devastation caused by the war with constant images of burning, and smoke, as well as the uncomfortable constant barrage of the sounds of war. The youthfulness of some of the characters in Apocalypse Now and in the doc made the impact of war both physical and psychological even more poignant. Herr’s article describes other sides to the soldiers lives and humanizes them giving insights to who they were before the war and before the nameless label of ‘soldier’, when he describes the inscriptions of their helmets, as stories of who they were, their loved ones and nicknames.
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All three sources really bring to life the war in differing ways. The article seemed to bring it to life through a personal account, however it somewhat lacked a vivid picture of the war like Apocalypse Now and the documentary did. In those it more so brought to life the seeming unpreparedness of the fighting force in general because it also showed the carnage and pain around them. It also brought about some different thoughts too about the war, mainly from Apocalypse Now, where we see how the war can make people lose their minds like it did with Lance and Kurtz. I would say overall the adaptations of the war in Vietnam furthered an understanding that many higher-ups felt that there may have been a lack of discipline, but there was also a constant fear of death since you could never see or know where the North Vietnamese were at any given time. I think overall these accounts just show how much the war took a toll on people to the point that they started to feel like it was normal and have fun with it.
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Apocalypse Now illustrates most how disorienting Vietnam was. The famous beginning scene with Willard drinking and fighting and dancing in his room with the sound of the fan resembling a helicopter perfectly displays how the war has confused Willard and his sense of reality. Additionally, Kurtz is overcome by the horror of the war, going insane deep in the jungle of Cambodia. The documentary showed that memories of the war were still vivid and haunting for the soldiers interviewed. While the film and documentary bring about the feeling of the soldiers in Vietnam, the article provided more details about the war. For example, Herr describes many of the dead bodies he witnessed on both sides of the war and the chilling effect it had on him. Many of the soldiers just wanted to go home, even hoping to get wounded so they could go back to the United States. The only way the general copes with is believing that the death and destruction going around him is just a part of war and nothing else. These three accounts together provide real details but also bring about the atmosphere and sentiment of the soldiers in Vietnam.
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In both reading Michael Herr and watching Apocalypse Now I feel the same sense of shock and awe. The Burns documentary provided a sense of reality, a sense of “this is what happened”, and while the Herr piece and the film are very realistic, they carry with them a sense of the surreal. Michael Herrs descriptions of the war and the intimate effects on the person are only made more vivid and striking as he talks equally about the sense of uselessness.The men dying in that hell don’t have even the satisfaction of dying for noble causes, and Herr describes that sensation well. Apocalypse now does the same, in particular during the French Plantation scene. There, both the Captain and the viewer are forced to reckon with their own notions of what’s right, and what’s worth fighting for. Apocalypse Now wove that thread of ambivalent sincerity so tightly that at times the film seemed surreal. Watching people surf while men are fighting and dying is bizarre, to say the least. But if a man dies in Vietnam on a surfboard, or he dies like the Ships Captain via a spear in the jungle, does it make a difference? Is one death more worthy? It’s this sense of useless, of abject futility that struck me the most. Watching Lance go utterly insane made me wonder, would I be any different? Confronted with the sheer horror, would I simply decide to negate it all under insanity? Even calling Lance insane fees unjustified; that’s how far the film went to shift my notions of reason and sanity. Lance was insane, but who wasn’t? Under those circumstances, insanity loses any distinct edges it may have held before and instead blurs seamlessly into the sane. Everyone is insane , so is anyone insane? Scenes like Lance dancing or surf-boards on helicopters are equally surreal, yet one is seemingly sane and the other not. After the movie I felt like I understood war in much the same I felt after reading Catch-22; everything is just absolutely nuts. In that way, both Herr and Coppola capture the insanity of the war, and once I considered that absolute lunacy, the concurrent movements towards psychedelia and towards expansion of consciousness make all the more sense. Who wouldn’t want a way to escape, or even better, a new form of sanity and consciousness?
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These sources vividly illustrate the horrors and violent confusions during the Vietnam War. Apocalypse Now delves into how every person possesses a primitive quality or savageness within them. The characters in the film, specifically the soldiers, become “broken up and ripped apart” by being sent to war (film). Many didn’t even think they would make it out alive, yet they kept fighting and killing and seeing their allies die. Those involved in the war truly went through hell and became the worst version of mankind. People went insane over the moral justification of the war and what really was right or wrong became very muddy. This war, along with others, was so horrific and took a toll on soldiers both physically and psychologically during the fighting and forever after. The sources provide just a few snapshots into the lasting impacts of the Vietnam War.
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In Apocalypse Now, director Francis Ford Coppola explores the psychological and moral toll of war. In his mission to find and eliminate Kurtz, Captain Willard is forced to become like his enemy, embracing an attitude of ruthlessness and near maniacal determination. His squad slowly succumbs to madness in the jungle; the experience of war hardens and transforms each of them. Another theme is the hypocrisy of the US military, which ostracizes Kurtz for his violent methods but itself participates in mass murder and glorifies violence against the Viet Cong.
Michael Herr’s article in Esquire relates to Apocalypse Now in revealing how the war in Vietnam had a transformative effect on the American soldiers stationed there. As the war progressed, Herr witnessed how the anxiety of constant shelling and killing impacted morale and psychological health. Just as how Willard was changed by his mission to kill Kurtz, in order to survive American soldiers had to become desensitized to extreme brutality. By examining the psychological impacts of war on the individual soldier, both the article and the movie help us understand how the Vietnam War devolved into such a violent and sustained conflict. -
Apocalypse Now mainly focuses on a group of American soldiers and how their minds and mentalities change throughout the war. The various horrors of war scar the diverse group of soldiers in a fairly gradual process. Although they still find time to fantasize about women, think about their homes, and have a little bit of fun, the soldiers’ tragic, bloody experiences truly mess with their sanity, and often leave them dead.
The Ken Burns documentary Vietnam takes a less personal approach, often looking at the war as a whole, using soldier experiences as examples. Vietnam portrays the soldiers as tough men who prayed and hoped for the end of a long war that the Viet Cong simply refused to give up.
Similar to Apocalypse Now, Michael Herr’s excerpt “Hell Sucks” underscores the diverse group of soldiers who fought side by side, in this case during the Tet Offensive. Soldiers like Philly Dog use their experiences from home to fight intelligently, yet the soldiers had little hope of making it out alive. Death encapsulated Hué, and it seemed inescapable, though soldiers tried to escape it.
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These three sources are linked together by showing the similarity in the plight of the solider. In the Ken Burns documentary, we gain an understanding of not only American troops on the ground, but also the effect of the war on North Vietnamese troops, and understand the nationalistic ideals of North Vietnam bound those soldiers together in a way that the American troops, brought together through a draft, could not feel. Ultimately, this was the difference in the way the war was fought on the ground. We got a similar feel from this ideal in the Michael Herr article, where the Tet Offensive is documented through the eyes of The General, showing a stale and dispassionate American leadership that doesn’t understand the nature of why the Vietnamese fight. Apocalypse Now brought these dichotomous forces to picture by demonstrating the low level and power of US ground troops when compared to their superiors. It showed the hierarchy that they had to endure while they put their own lives in danger that became evident in the Herr article. Together, these three sources put together a fuller picture of the lives of people during the Vietnam War and I look forward to being able to learn more about all of these forces in class.
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All three sources are linked together in the sense of covering the dehumanizing process of war, yet through different angles. As for Apocalypse now, much of the premise is based on insanity and the process of dehumanization through war. One example of this is in the surfing scene where Lieutenant Kilgore orders/permits one of his soldiers who was a former renowned surfer to ride the waves during an invasion and full on battle of a village. In addition, the very essence of Kurtz and his moral ambiguities provoke the concept of what right and wrong even is anymore, a deconstructive process that can be interpreted as dehumanizing. The Ken Burns documentary also shows the dehumanizing aspect of war but it also has a retrospective aspect as he interviews veterans after the war is over with. This allows them to reflect on their time and perhaps recollect their humanity after those years of turmoil and madness. For example, the soldier who describes how he took advantage of a woman sexually is able to look back at his actions through a new lens and realize the horror, madness and depravity in them.
Michael Herr demonstrates how death is inevitable, and the soldiers know that. He describes from the soldiers account how death was all around them and there was nothing much they can do. In one example, a soldier mentions how it was like being crew members on the sinking titanic: they were present, aware and alive but knew that a high change of doom was coming soon. This also messed with the soldiers psychologically and very well would be a reason why many acted with depravity such as in the My Lai Massacre. -
The question seems a ‘no-brainer’ — narrative is an effective manner of “enabling a better understanding”, in any context. We desire text (and the ‘text’ of film and documentary, as well), and, thus, any presentation of such ‘text’ plays on this desire and allows for us to better grasp what might be iterated (and what might have been iterated in a non-narrative text [whatever that may be — a textbook, ironically, comes to mind!])! The ability to see the war as interpreted by others (in film made after the event [and after reflection, etc.]) indeed facilitated a better understanding of the war and allowed for my own interpretations and understandings of the event to follow. (This ‘fixation’ of the event, as Ricoeur called it, in the pieces presented, indeed allowed for my own ‘understanding’ (again, his term) of the event.)
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Vietnam War happened 50 years ago. It is impossible for any of us in this generation to actually experience it. As a result, we need many second hand resources from all perspectives to study it comprehensively. And each of these three sources contribute to a better understanding of the Vietnam War.
First, in ken Burns documentary, we are able to feel the terror that Vietnam War brought to people. It depicted the effect of the war on not only US troops but also on North Vietnamese troops. It also pointed out a vital spirit that North Vietnamese troops had, but US troops did not have. It is the nationalistic spirit. They wanted to defend their own country. It is impossible for US troops who brought together through draft to defeat an army like that.
Second, in Michael Herr, he showed us how vulnerable lives are, and how death is inevitable. His vivid depiction draw us a picture that death is just like wind, always by soldiers sides. Even they know that, there is not much they can do. -
I can’t help but be struck every time I watch the opening scene of “Apocalypse Now”. The anecdotes that Martin Sheen’s behavior here is improvised bring a level of hyper-reality to the performance that makes war-induced mental illness feel very visceral and real.
I found some confirmation for this aesthetic portrayal in the Michael Herr piece as well. I was particularly intrigued by this passage, about Herr’s relationship with a character named only “the General”;
“Sometimes, he worries about me, about my safety and, even more, about my sanity. I have what he refers to as “this thing about death,” an unhealthy fascination with so much of what I’ve had to see here. He respects it intellectually (one of our other constant topics is suicide) but finally he finds it morbid and unprofitable. Worst of all, he finds that I have a tendency, when discussing the dead, to not only dwell on them, but to personalize them as well. “That way lies you-know-what,” he says, tapping his temple; but he lets me get it out, lets me talk about the victims, about the dead and the disposition of the dead.”
On the one hand, the General seems more sympathetic than some; he is willing to talk to Herr about his fear of the dead. Nonetheless, I was struck by the way this general finds musing on the dead to be “morbid and unprofitable”. From the perspective of a successful war machine, this makes pragmatic sense; at the same time, one can see how soldiers were expected by some to give up things that I feel are parts of our humanity, like a revulsion at killing and a fear of one’s own consciousness being extinguished.
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