Film Critique On The Deer Hunter

Since 1968, there have been at least 25 films made that portray the events of the Vietnam War. Historians have to ask themselves when watching these films, "Did the fictional character represent historical figures accurately? Is this how a soldier would react in this situation?" The point of view of the director of the film can change with simple alterations in camera angles. For example, a view from the ground of a battle seen can show how the innocent people had the war in their own backyards. The view from a helicopter can show Viet Cong firing rounds at American troops and the troops can't tell the difference between the innocent and the enemy. The audience feels empathy and sympathy for the person from whose point of view the camera is showing. Historians compare the trueness of one film to the rest, and they have found that every film is at least somewhat fabricated, and at least somewhat true.

The 1978 film, The Deer Hunter, is about three blue-collar Pennsylvania factory workers who are drafted during the Vietnam War. This film won the Best Picture Oscar Award in 1979, so it was a good movie, however it didn't have much to do with the actual war itself. The movie is three hours long and the first third of the movie takes place in Pennsylvania to introduce the situation. Only about 40 minutes of it took place in Vietnam. Only five minutes of that involved a war seen, 20 minutes of it took place in a POW camp where the characters are forced to play Russian roulette against each other, and the rest on the streets of Saigon. The last third of the movie involves Michael, played by Robert DeNiro, going back home alone to his old life. At the end, he goes back to Vietnam to try and recover Nick, played by Christoph...

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...are not spreading information primarily for money. The reason why movies are mostly fictional is because the point of a movie is to make money and the makers of the movie won't get people to come to the theaters without a plot. The plot usually does not contain a character based on a historical figure, but even if it is based on a true story, there are fabrications to save money in the budget. For example, the Oliver Stone, who directed Born on the Fourth of July, filmed a scene at Syracuse University that took place in Washington because filming the scene at the nation's capital would've been too expensive (After the Fact page 404). In the end, money is probably the reason for the exaggeration of historical events in films. If screenwriters didn't have to be concerned with making a movie attractive to viewers, they could stick to the historical truth more often.