Stanley Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket splits a war in two, and the first half is the one that still hurts. The 1987 film follows a platoon of U.S. Marines from boot camp at Parris Island, South Carolina, through the Tet Offensive in Da Nang and Huế. It runs 117 minutes. It was the last Kubrick film released in his lifetime.
The title refers to the full metal jacket bullet used by military servicemen. The film is based on Gustav Hasford’s 1979 autobiographical novel The Short-Timers, adapted by Kubrick, Michael Herr and Hasford.
R. Lee Ermey Was Not Vicious Enough
Kubrick cast Hartman through Warner Bros. with a search across the United States and Canada. He used videotape to audition actors and received over 3,000 submissions. His staff screened the tapes down to 800 for him to review.
R. Lee Ermey was originally hired as a technical advisor. He had been a U.S. Marines drill instructor in the Vietnam War. He asked Kubrick if he could read for Hartman. Kubrick had seen Ermey play drill instructor Staff Sergeant Loyce in The Boys in Company C (1978) and told him he was not vicious enough for the part.
Ermey improvised insulting dialogue at a group of Royal Marines under consideration as background Marines. Kubrick watched the tape and offered him the role, saying he “was a genius for this part.” Kubrick folded the 250-page transcript of Ermey’s rants into the script. That decision is the spine of the film’s first half.
Vincent D’Onofrio Gained 70 Pounds
Kubrick called Pyle “the hardest part to cast in the whole movie.” Matthew Modine suggested Vincent D’Onofrio. D’Onofrio gained 70 pounds (32 kg) for the role.
The film opens with eight weeks of Recruit Training. Hartman uses harsh methods on the recruits. Joker earns his nickname after mocking Hartman. Leonard Lawrence, overweight and slow-minded, is nicknamed “Gomer Pyle.”
Pyle improves, then Hartman finds a jelly doughnut in his footlocker. Hartman begins collective punishment, punishing everyone except Pyle for each of Pyle’s mistakes. The recruits retaliate with a blanket party. Joker joins under pressure.
Afterward Pyle reinvents himself as a model recruit, showing expertise in marksmanship. Hartman is impressed. Joker is not. He sees Pyle talking to his rifle and believes Pyle is breaking down.
The Latrine Scene Ends the First Half
On the night before the Marines leave Parris Island, Joker is on fire watch. He finds Pyle in the barracks latrine, loading his M14 with live ammunition, executing drill commands and reciting the Rifleman’s Creed.
Hartman orders Pyle to put the rifle down. Pyle fatally shoots Hartman, then kills himself in front of Joker. It is the cleanest, cruelest cut in the film, and it lands before the war proper has begun.
Da Nang, January 1968
By January 1968 Joker is a sergeant based in Da Nang for Stars and Stripes, working alongside Private First Class “Rafter Man,” a combat photographer. Their base is attacked as part of the Tet Offensive.
The second half moves Joker and the Lusthog Squad through Da Nang and Huế. Adam Baldwin plays Sergeant “Animal Mother,” a nihilistic, combat-hungry machine gunner who takes pride in killing enemy soldiers and scorns any authority but his own. Dorian Harewood plays Corporal “Eightball,” unfazed by racial slurs and Animal Mother’s closest friend. Arliss Howard plays Cowboy Evans, a friend of Joker from Texas. Ed O’Ross plays First Lieutenant Walter J. “Mr. Touchdown” Schinoski. John Terry plays First Lieutenant Lockhart, editor of the Da Nang Stars and Stripes. Kieron Jecchinis plays Sergeant “Crazy Earl.”
The Numbers Behind the Film
- Release: June 26, 1987 (U.S.), September 11, 1987 (U.K.), by Warner Bros.
- Runtime: 117 minutes
- Budget: $16.5–30 million
- Gross: $120 million
- Score: 8.2/10
- Awards: Academy Award nomination, Best Adapted Screenplay; two BAFTA nominations; Golden Globe nomination, Best Supporting Actor, R. Lee Ermey
| Section | Setting | Period |
|---|---|---|
| Boot camp | Parris Island, South Carolina | Eight weeks of Recruit Training |
| Latrine scene | Parris Island barracks | Night before departure |
| Stars and Stripes | Da Nang | January 1968 |
| Street fighting | Huế | Tet Offensive |
What the Awards Got Right
The Academy nominated Full Metal Jacket for Best Adapted Screenplay. The film also picked up two BAFTA nominations. Ermey was nominated for a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture.
Ermey’s nomination is the one that reads correctly now. He built Hartman out of his own experience as a drill instructor and improvised much of the dialogue, and the transcript of those rants ran 250 pages. That is not a performance so much as a document. The screenplay nomination is harder to defend. The second half of Full Metal Jacket drifts where the first half locks in, and the drift is structural, not incidental.
The Second Half Is the Weaker Half
Full Metal Jacket is two films sharing a runtime. The Parris Island section is close to perfect: a closed system, a fixed set of rules, a recruit who cannot survive them, and a drill instructor who is the system’s voice. The Huế section has more money on screen and less pressure in it. Joker becomes an observer in his own film.
The title promises the bullet. The first half delivers the thing the bullet is for.
What holds the whole film together is that Kubrick never asks the audience to like the Marines or the war. The boot camp section works because Hartman’s cruelty is procedural. The Vietnam section works less well because the film keeps looking for a center and settles for Joker’s camera.
Where the Film Lands
Full Metal Jacket earns its place on the strength of its first hour. Ermey’s Hartman and D’Onofrio’s Pyle are the reason the film is still watched, and the reason its boot camp scenes get quoted decades later. The Huế material is uneven, and the film’s reputation rests on a section that ends before the war it is named for begins.
The dehumanizing effects the synopsis promises are delivered early, at Parris Island, by a man with a transcript and no script. Everything after is aftermath.
Against a budget of $16.5–30 million, the film grossed $120 million. That is a hit, and it should be. It is also the last Kubrick film released in his lifetime, which means the director never got to answer for the split. He did not need to. The first half answers for it.
Score: 8.2 of 10.
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