I watch "The Green Berets" more than once every year just to stir up both memories and the stewing pot of controversy. In that pot are several ingredients of the movie and of the politics of the time. One of those ingredients is location.
Vietnam is an amalgamation of three separate topographies (formerly separate countries). Most jungle in the vast delta of the mighty Mekong river has been cleared away for centuries to accommodate rice fields. Much of the central highlands area (where this movie is set) is forested (with pines and lots of scrub growth)growing in generally poor soil (red dust)... not too much different than what you will find in parts of North Carolina and Georgia. Were you out there? If not, your ideas about the location are merely speculative.
When "The Green Berets" was filmed, the war was still going on. So, some realism would have to be sacrificed for the safety of cast and crew, I think. Thus, the sunset 'problem' (Shouting at the detail).
Another ingredient is the nature of the personnel. That is, bona fide Special Forces soldiers were (and are) completely different than any other force with exceptions for certain Marine Corps units which faced the same situations as did the real Green Berets (e.g., at Khe Sanh). NO ONE who was military other than Special Forces has any idea at all of what they did or said.
Encirclement of outposts manned by Special Forces or Marine units was always undertaken by regular PAVN (People's Army of Vietnam) units. The VC were not usually involved. General Giap used the same methods at Dien Bien Phu...encircle and assault by superior numbers (no matter how many died...the PAVN had little care for their soldiers' lives).
That we were 'right' about the people (some of them, anyway) was demonstrated after the war ended when the VietNamese government exterminated many thousands (some say over 100,000) Montagnards. Montagnards were usually allied with Special Forces units, as the movie clearly shows.
The American military did not 'lose' the conflict at all - it was given away by politicians. Simply check the casualty numbers. The ignominy lay in the submission by 'President Cronkite' on national TV.
There are other elements in the pot, but those don't matter much.
I watch "The Green Berets" in 2 parts. The first part is totally realistic, as far as the crude effects would permit. I overlook the technical failures. The second part is really not credible at all, but it is kind of fun, in a way. Such a snatch mission would take weeks to arrange and that requirement is not addressed in the movie. It just happens, as if it were undertaken in the next few days.
While I have versions of "Apocalypse Now" and its "Redux," I do not have other Vietnam war movies such as "Platoon" (an aberration), "The Deer Hunter" (preposterous), "Hamburger Hill" (stumbling) or "Full Metal Jacket" (another aberration), although I have subjected myself to having watched them all at one time or another.
I watch "The Green Berets" for another chance to get mad at Maltin and other speculators who were not out there and do not understand at all. I watch it with Closed Captions (I started using CC about 6 years ago and I find it enriches my movie watching experience) but "The Green Berets" is rather poorly captioned. I complained to the captioning company and suggested they use an experienced person to at least CHECK the 'technical' terminology. For example, fougasse is called "boo gas," the commo bunker is called the "com-o bunker," Colonel Kirby's Mike Force is called a "Might Force" and there are all kinds of captions for "Fong" which is NOT a VietNamese name (Pham or Phon, maybe), among other boo-boos.
With some reservations, I recommend "The Green Berets" for the first part of it and the general tone of its Point Of View which represents the prevailing notion in both the government and the military at that time.
Vietnam is an amalgamation of three separate topographies (formerly separate countries). Most jungle in the vast delta of the mighty Mekong river has been cleared away for centuries to accommodate rice fields. Much of the central highlands area (where this movie is set) is forested (with pines and lots of scrub growth)growing in generally poor soil (red dust)... not too much different than what you will find in parts of North Carolina and Georgia. Were you out there? If not, your ideas about the location are merely speculative.
When "The Green Berets" was filmed, the war was still going on. So, some realism would have to be sacrificed for the safety of cast and crew, I think. Thus, the sunset 'problem' (Shouting at the detail).
Another ingredient is the nature of the personnel. That is, bona fide Special Forces soldiers were (and are) completely different than any other force with exceptions for certain Marine Corps units which faced the same situations as did the real Green Berets (e.g., at Khe Sanh). NO ONE who was military other than Special Forces has any idea at all of what they did or said.
Encirclement of outposts manned by Special Forces or Marine units was always undertaken by regular PAVN (People's Army of Vietnam) units. The VC were not usually involved. General Giap used the same methods at Dien Bien Phu...encircle and assault by superior numbers (no matter how many died...the PAVN had little care for their soldiers' lives).
That we were 'right' about the people (some of them, anyway) was demonstrated after the war ended when the VietNamese government exterminated many thousands (some say over 100,000) Montagnards. Montagnards were usually allied with Special Forces units, as the movie clearly shows.
The American military did not 'lose' the conflict at all - it was given away by politicians. Simply check the casualty numbers. The ignominy lay in the submission by 'President Cronkite' on national TV.
There are other elements in the pot, but those don't matter much.
I watch "The Green Berets" in 2 parts. The first part is totally realistic, as far as the crude effects would permit. I overlook the technical failures. The second part is really not credible at all, but it is kind of fun, in a way. Such a snatch mission would take weeks to arrange and that requirement is not addressed in the movie. It just happens, as if it were undertaken in the next few days.
While I have versions of "Apocalypse Now" and its "Redux," I do not have other Vietnam war movies such as "Platoon" (an aberration), "The Deer Hunter" (preposterous), "Hamburger Hill" (stumbling) or "Full Metal Jacket" (another aberration), although I have subjected myself to having watched them all at one time or another.
I watch "The Green Berets" for another chance to get mad at Maltin and other speculators who were not out there and do not understand at all. I watch it with Closed Captions (I started using CC about 6 years ago and I find it enriches my movie watching experience) but "The Green Berets" is rather poorly captioned. I complained to the captioning company and suggested they use an experienced person to at least CHECK the 'technical' terminology. For example, fougasse is called "boo gas," the commo bunker is called the "com-o bunker," Colonel Kirby's Mike Force is called a "Might Force" and there are all kinds of captions for "Fong" which is NOT a VietNamese name (Pham or Phon, maybe), among other boo-boos.
With some reservations, I recommend "The Green Berets" for the first part of it and the general tone of its Point Of View which represents the prevailing notion in both the government and the military at that time.