Clip (3:51)
Entire Video (17:50)
The premise of this project is the argument that five Oliver Stone films are actually part of a single narrative about the seminal events of the 1960s and early 1970s. The clips from Born on the 4th of July (1989), Heaven & Earth (1993) , JFK (1991), Nixon (1995), and Platoon (1986) included in this project were edited to form a single narrative to help illustrate Stone’s argument that the assassination of President Kennedy was likely the result of a conspiracy that ultimately led to the escalation of the Vietnam War. While films like JFK and Nixon focus on the politics and crimes committed by those in power; Born on the 4th of July (1989), Heaven & Earth (1993), and Platoon (1986) provide insight into the destructive effects of the Vietnam War on those without political power, the ordinary foot soldier, an idealistic and patriotic teenager, and a Vietnamese girl.
With this in mind, I edited the project so that clips from JFK (1991) and Nixon (1995) would bookend clips from the other three films. The intent was to show how politics, crime, and high-level decisions made by those in power affected our soldiers and the Vietnamese; the end result, as Stone would likely agree, was that Vietnam represented a morality battle that challenged the mythology of America by vying for the souls of the soldier and the nation.
A question that I attempted to answer with this project was whether Oliver Stone could be considered an auteur. There is a saying about writing that states you should write about what you know, and I believe that this is an apt description of the body of Stone’s work. His comfort zone is films about the 1960s and 1970s because he is a product of that generation; his biography parallels the lives of the idealistic soldiers, Chris Taylor and Ron Kovic, in Platoon (1986) and Born on the 4th of July (1989); their words and internal conflicts are his.
Thus, it is no wonder that the narratives of these films have such coherency and resonance that they would apparently elevate Stone to the level of auteur. This conclusion might be a reasonable one if Stone continued to build on this about the events of that historical period; when Stone leaves this comfort zone, his work seems to suffer, e.g., Alexander (2004), Any Given Sunday (1999). Stone’s voice seems to be missing in his non-Vietnam era films, which might lead you to a different conclusion about whether Stone is an auteur. Of course, the argument may be moot since the validity of auteur theory as a means of film criticism is open to debate, especially in light of postmodern thoughts on authorship.
From a technical perspective, this project was a challenge because I was just beginning to learn how to edit. Now that I’ve watched this project again after a few years have passed, I can see many things that could be changed to make the piece stronger; I didn’t know about split edits back then. As I was preparing this video to post on this website, I attempted to make several changes only to have Final Cut Pro lock up with each attempt; but I’m sure I’ll eventually be able to get past the technical gremlins to make the improvements I have in mind.
