This certainly is not the best movie ever made about Americans fighting in Vietnam. I would say that honor belongs with "Go Tell The Spartans". However, it does rank near the top. Many post- Vietnam films on Vietnam have been critically acclaimed, such as "Full Metal Jacket", "Platoon" or "The Deer Hunter". The Green Berets is about heroism, whereas the aforementioned reinforce an entirely different myth about confused and misdirected undisciplined teenage rebels lead by corrupt aimless leaders, which is of course a complete insult to the integrity and professional character of the US Armed Forces in Vietnam. We can have the heroic myth or we can have the disfunctional myth, but what of reality? Honor, discipline, courage, adherence to duty, professionalism. What of these virtues? The Green Berets does a better job than the critically popular films of the 70s and 80s in this regard. But in terms of heroism, it stands above. The American fighting man in Vietnam was a hero in every sense of the word. Witness the record of the Communists in Southeast Asia during and after the war: Large scale atrocities, economic tyranny, corruption, murder and torture - that is the calling card of the communist. The American soldier in Vietnam risked and sometimes gave his life to counter this horrific enemy. The Green Berets merely tries to portray this heroism in compact albeit flawed form. For this John Wayne deserves praise, for few have (or could have) the guts to do so. The cast of heroes: Luke Askew (Provo), Jim Hutton (Petersen), Aldo Ray (Muldoon), Raymond St. Jaques (Doc) and George Takei (Nim) are symbols of this valiant struggle. Finally, there is Puff the Magic Dragon, which symbolizes the aspirations of all those who wanted freedom in Vietnam, as it rains a torrent of lead on North Vietnamese Regulars who have overrun the camp. This is a sentimental favorite, not a piece of high brow cinema trying to over-intellectualize a complex topic.
Review of The Green Berets
