5 Essential Films About the Vietnam War
War movies have existed for as long as cinema itself, with 1898’s 38-second Tearing Down the Spanish Flag beginning a tradition that continues to this day. And while World War II has likely inspired more films than any other conflict, the latter half of the Vietnam War took place during an especially fruitful period in the movie industry: the director-driven New Hollywood era, a time when young, ambitious filmmakers were given unprecedented control over their work. As this era was largely youth-driven, it naturally follows that some of its most important movies were about a watershed event in American history that younger audiences had on their mind whether at the movies or elsewhere — especially those who had to register for the draft.
The list of filmmakers who responded to that growing sense of disenchantment includes Michael Cimino, Francis Ford Coppola, and Stanley Kubrick, all of whom contributed to the canon of great movies about the Vietnam War. Here are five of the very best.
The Deer Hunter (1978)
The first thing to know about The Deer Hunter is its cast, led by Robert De Niro, Meryl Streep, Christopher Walken, and John Cazale — who only appeared in five films throughout his too-short career, all five of which were nominated for Best Picture. The second is how heartbreaking it is. As personal as it is political, The Deer Hunter begins in a small Pennsylvania town before shifting the action to Vietnam, where three close friends from that tight-knit community meet tragically different fates. Not all the tragedy takes place onscreen: Cazale’s scenes were shot first, as he was dying of cancer when production began; the studio wanted to replace the actor, but both Cimino and Steep (who was in a relationship with Cazale) threatened to leave if they did. He didn’t live to see the completed film.
He likely would have been proud if he had, as The Deer Hunter is a powerful reminder that war doesn’t always end on the battlefield. It won five of the nine Academy Awards it was nominated for — including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Supporting Actor for Walken — and was added to the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress in 1996.
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Apocalypse Now (1979)
“My film is not about Vietnam,” Francis Ford Coppola famously said of his long-in-the-making Apocalypse Now. “It is Vietnam.” As quite possibly the most acclaimed filmmaker of the 1970s, having previously directed the first two Godfather movies as well as The Conversation, Coppola had a commitment to the project that led to astronomically high expectations. Production nearly spiraled out of control, and Coppola later remarked that “we were in the jungle, there were too many of us, we had access to too much money, too much equipment, and little by little we went insane.”
A loose adaptation of Joseph Conrad’s novella Heart of Darkness, Apocalypse Now follows a disenchanted Army captain (Martin Sheen) who’s been given the unenviable task of assassinating a rogue colonel (Marlon Brando) whose fanatically loyal troops concur with his assessment that he’s become a kind of god. What follows is strange, harrowing, and unforgettable. Though initial reviews were divided, Apocalypse Now won the prestigious Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for eight Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director. Its reputation has only grown with time, and the film is now regarded as one of the greatest war movies ever made.
Good Morning, Vietnam (1987)
War comedies are few and far between for self-evident reasons — the subject matter doesn’t exactly lend itself to laughter — but there are some exceptions. Good Morning, Vietnam is among the most notable, not least because of Robin Williams’ performance as a DJ for the Armed Forces Radio Service. He raises the morale of troops just as he raises the ire of higher-ups, making him both a folk hero and a problem to be solved. Williams, playing the real-life Adrian Cronauer, improvised many of the radio broadcasts that serve as the film’s centerpiece, earning him a Golden Globe and his first Oscar nomination.
Full Metal Jacket (1987)
The poster says it all: a helmet with “born to kill” written next to a peace sign. Only Stanley Kubrick could make a movie like Full Metal Jacket, a Vietnam epic that begins with the most disturbing portrayal of boot camp you’ll ever see and ends with traumatized soldiers singing the “Mickey Mouse March.” Kubrick, whose nonpareil filmography includes everything from 2001: A Space Odyssey and The Shining to Dr. Strangelove and A Clockwork Orange, read Gustav Hasford’s 1979 novel The Short-Timers twice in 1982 before deciding to adapt it — a process that included just the sort of extensive research for which the meticulous filmmaker was known.
Divided into two sections — the first at basic training, the second in Vietnam — Full Metal Jacket introduced the world to R. Lee Ermey, a former drill sergeant whose haunting performance became the measuring stick for all such characters past and present.
Da 5 Bloods (2020)
Movies about the Vietnam War aren’t as common today as they were in the 1970s and ’80s, when the conflict was either still ongoing or fresh in the memory. But Spike Lee has never cared what was en vogue, and Da 5 Bloods — about a group of Black soldiers who return to Vietnam to exhume the treasure they buried there during the war — is a highlight of his uniquely impressive filmography. That’s thanks in large part to standout performances from Delroy Lindo and Chadwick Boseman (in one of the Black Panther star’s final roles before his untimely passing), who bring the director’s vision to vibrant life.
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