Long live The Duke! (The Green Berets (DVD))

Member Name: joecooper

Product:	The Green Berets (DVD)
Date:	21/02/03 (223 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: The Duke, The Duke, A good guys versus bag guys simplistic story

Disadvantages: It's a piece of LBJ propaganda, and it shows.

Ah, John Wayne! "The Duke". How I miss him.

No, he never actually herded a million head of cattle from Alaska down to Texas by himself whilst ignoring a bullet wound to the stomach. Nor did he really fight and die in three world wars. However, on the silver screen, The Duke (and that's all I'm calling him from now on) walked, talked, spat, rode, and shot like he'd done it all, twice.

While the bras were still smoldering in the 1960s sexual revolution, The Duke stood apart as a towering man's man in the world of cinema. In my Dad's eyes, there was no finer example of what a man should be than The Duke. I recall clearly the strange excitement I'd get from humiliating myself in front of his beer-drinking mates as a kid. Yes, I was 'forced' to do my Little Duke routine in front of visitors, complete with swagger and squeaky "Out here, due process is a bullet!" At the age of six, it was all very exciting, especially considering the fact that my Little Elvis was tired and clearly waning. But I digress!

The Green Berets is the first movie featuring The Duke that I ever had my father's pleasure to see. Perversely, and despite living in denial for many years, I now find myself a born-again fan. Call it nostalgia, but I love The Duke!

*Who's The Duke in this one?*

In The Green Berets, The Duke struts around like a gigantic rooster as Colonel Mike Kirby. He's the commander of a group of US Army Special Forces (Green Berets) right in the thick of things during the Vietnam War. If there's a firebase on the verge of being overrun by the boys in black pyjamas, The Duke's there. Similarly, if there's a mission impossible to be completed, well, why would the bumbling generals look past The Duke?

*What's the story? Is there a story?*

The Green Berets was partly a propaganda film for President Johnson. No, the making of the film wasn'
;t LBJ's idea, but he fell all over himself to provide all the military props that The Duke asked for. It was 1968 and the US Government was in a little bit of a pickle as popular opinion began to swing increasingly against the continuation of the war in Southeast Asia. The Green Berets, as well as being an action romp, also attempted to carry a little pro-war message.

The film features two plots within its basic 'we're here in Vietnam for all the right reasons' message - one major, and one minor.

The major story revolves around a personality and ideology clash between The Duke and a reporter, George Beckworth (David Jansen). George the journo is researching a story for a newspaper that doesn't agree with American troops being in Vietnam. He's there to get the details on how it's all a fiasco and how the locals don't appreciate foreign soldiers. George and The Duke lock horns on and off, until George is prompted by his conscience to grab a rifle and help in a desperate defensive firefight. As a result, the pinko liberal journalist comes completely to his senses on the whole war issue - thanks to The Duke.

The minor plot involves The Duke and his boys being assigned on an apparently suicidal mission to capture a North Vietnamese general. The Duke hardly works up a sweat to pull this little feat off.

I'm not going to give away the ending to The Green Berets, especially the departing scene of the film. However, I will say that I still cringe so hard that my teeth hurt. But it's a good hurt, because it's The Duke who's the dentist!

*What's cool about this movie?*

The Green Berets is full of all the things little boys like. Explosions, gunplay, and macho one-liners. However, The Green Beret doesn't burden us with any difficult moral questions, like later Vietnam-era films like Platoon. Instead it just concentrates on good guys versus bad guys. The bad guys
in The Green Berets aren't even tastelessly referred to as 'gooks' and 'zips'. The enemy is politely referred to solely as either the NVA or the VC.

Ok, a little taste of what I found cool.

Firebases

Being a lad, I'm all for anything that resembles a siege with all the lads inside fighting off the evil hordes outside. In The Green Berets, this little fantasy is supplied in the form of the firebases that the US troops set up as fortified outposts in the jungle full of nasty enemies.

Booby traps

All of the booby traps that I've seen in films over the years combined are outnumbered by the sheer multitude of them in The Green Berets. In The Duke's Vietnam you can't walk 5 yards without a pit full of poison-tipped bamboo spikes opening up to impale you. For the admirer of nasty surprises, The Green Berets will tantalize.

The Duke himself

Fans of The Duke know that you can watch the man himself swagger around for hours on end. We just sit fascinated waiting for a pearl of macho wisdom to slip out of the side of his clam (mouth). The Duke's in The Green Berets. Enough said.

The Duke is dead. Long live The Duke!

*The Joe's final words*

The Green Berets is basic, and not even a fifth as slick as Platoon or Casualties Of War. Instead of Vangelis fiddling with the soundtrack, you've got the military drums leading you into the film's important moments. However, it's a fascinating look at what pro-war Hollywood thought of the Vietnam conflict while it still raged. The Green Berets was after all released in 1968. It's all very well to consider Oliver Stone and Stanley Kubrick as clever with their 20 year hindsight, but it's also interesting to see what was going on in the cinema as America was sadly on its way to losing its first major conflict, at the expense of so many young lives.

Back to The Duke, before
I get too serious. The Green Berets is great gung-ho action on his part, and more than worth a look for fans and the uninitiated alike. I'm promoting The Duke from colonel to a 4 star general.

Cheers for reading.

Joe

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