Southern Comfort

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Southern Comfort

Visual communications I

We are shaped by the world around us, all we experience in life determines our way of thinking and ultimately defines who we are. This essay will show how the film "southern comfort" demonstrates this and how perception is affected by our surrounding and our experiences.

The commanding officer of team Bravo because of his service and Discharge in the Vietnam war gave him the leadership qualities the would have been a great help later in the film,. He , while he was alive, displayed some bitterness at the fact that he was in the national guard and not fighting in the war, that he cast aside to and now had to lead a bunch of misfits in routine training exercises he believed would never put to good use. The fact that he Allowed his men to steal canoes from locals displays his weariness of the service because no normal commanding officer would allow such acts within the US

Reese was decidedly the proverbial rebel without a cause. He displayed an apathetic attitude since he was a new addition to the national guard in the state of Louisiana. His unpleasant past experiences in the Texas national guard lead him to believe it would be no different in this unit and so became the stereotypical rebel without a cause.Interacting with the others "troops" when spoken to and never in a receptive fashion. So it is not surprising that when faced in that combat situation he did not volunteer his opinion of impose his will on the other troops unless the situation was critical to their survival.

Stuckie, otherwise know as the village idiot in any other environment, did not present any maturity to any one, the fact that he pointed an armed weapon and fired it at a fellow officer despite using blanks demonstrated that fact quite clearly. He viewed everthing as a joke and took nothing seriously especially Firearms and by his actions, shooting on the Cajuns with blanks, put Bravo team in jeopardy. If it were not for his immaturity and shear stupidity, bravo may have been spared however there wouldn't be much of a movie either.

Cultural differences also contribute a a persons personality. The black officer was a reminder of that in addition to be a token black character so that African Americans who viewed this movie could identify with it.

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