A Disappointing Continuation

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

One of the better war films you'll ever see this movie explores the mind of a soldier more than the setting and action (which do have emphasis payed upon them) and for those reasons is exceptional. Playing on the likes of 'Full Metal Jacket' which has come before and being truly unique there's more of a focus on what's not happening and how the characters pass time which is truly unique. The ending is heartbreaking and also satisfying in equal measure, a great surprise I highly recommend you watch

Anthony "Swoff" Swofford could have gone to college; instead he enlisted in the US Marine Corps… he soon starts to wonder if he made the right choice. He isn't very enthusiastic but shows aptitude with a rifle and ends up a Sniper Scout. When Saddam Hussein's forces invade Kuwait in the summer of 1990 it looks as though Swoff and his comrades are about to see action. They deploy to Saudi Arabia and await their orders to cross the border. They wait and they wait and they wait; as the weeks and months pass they stew in the desert and boredom takes its toll. Tempers fray, discipline breaks down and Swoff starts to question his sanity. When the order is finally given the war moves so fast that the Marines are behind the action; all they see is the aftermath of air attacks and burning oil fields then just as it looks as if they are going to see action the war is over.This is unusual for a 'war' movie in that there is so little actual war. Before that we get training scenes that will be familiar to anybody who has seen 'Full Metal Jacket' and the bulk of the film that shows us the marines waiting to go into battle. These scenes impressively capture the boredom and frustration the men suffer. Some of the ill-discipline is rather surprising; one can only hope that it is exaggerated for dramatic effect… especially the scene where Swoff threatens a fellow Marine with a loaded rifle! The scenes showing what the squad see during the war are disturbing without being too upsetting; most notably the night scene amongst the burning oil wells. The cast is solid with Jake Gyllenhaal dominating as Swoff. Overall I'd recommend this to anybody wanting a war film that is somewhat different to most; importantly for a film that is largely about boredom I never found it boring.

A few weeks prior to watching "Jarhead" in its entirety, I saw some clips of it on television and thought that perhaps it would be the "Rambo" of our generation. Unfortunately, I was severely disappointed.Basically (Spoiler Alert), the plot of Jarhead follows a Marine Unit (focusing on one solider played by Jake Gyllenhaal) that is called into active duty during Operation Desert Storm. However, "action" is the furthest thing from the minds of the Marines, as they (in the words of their commanding officer) do nothing but "train, hydrate, train, hydrate some more, and maintain a constant state of suspicious alertness". Even when the unit does get the opportunity to carry out a designated mission, they are quickly and easily booted aside by the ever-popular air attacks. As the Gulf War ends, the entire unit has not fired a single shot in aggression throughout the entire campaign.This film did one major thing right, but also seemed to generalize about a number of things that I did not appreciate:What works is the focus on Gyllenhaal's character and the mind-set the he embodies through the entire process. He is pretty much lost when he enters the Marines, but then goes (in stages) from being utterly confused, to angry for enlisting, to ready to fight, to confused once again about his role in the entire process. Though uncomfortable at times (as we prefer to think of our returning soldiers as no less than out and out heroes), it was interesting to see a sampling of the emotions that likely beset our young men and women serving abroad.The main reason the film turned me off a bit, though, is the generalization it made about the U.S. military. Sure, I understand that the ground troops may not have been as effective in a war fought out in the desert, but I cannot bring myself to believe that all military life (while not bombing the crap out of something from above) is boring and pointless. The Marines are still an elite combat unit that serves their country to the utmost, and I don't believe for a second that they find their task to be as boring or inane as director Sam Mendes portrays it. It almost seems as if Mendes (although not overly preachy about it, which was good) was using the example of the Gulf War to cast a pall over the entire current military structure/usefulness.Thus, while Jarhead is a decent film that touches on some uncomfortable social/personal issues surrounding enlistment in the U.S. military, it ultimately fails to live up to my "next Rambo" tag due to a few over-generalizations that could very easily be used to unfairly steer audiences into an anti-military frame of mind.

Amazing performances in this modern war movie especially from Jake Gyllenhaal who embodies (real life) marine Anthony Swofford, following him through boot camp to his assignment as an elite sniper during Operation Desert Storm. For the most part what this movie portrays is the ultimate boredom, frustration and psychological challenges these soldiers faced, waiting for their moment to "see the pink mist." There are some funny scenes here, some we've seen many times before (boot camp) but the strong cast (Jamie Foxx and Wow that "take the shot" scene in the bunker with Peter Sarsgaard) really give us some amazing performances.This is also an absolutely gorgeous movie, I mean the cinematography is breathtaking, sometimes seen through a faulty gas mask or a game of desert football, with flaming oil fields in the night sky, black rain and an oil drenched, drowning horse. Haunting. as was the ending when we see the guys several years later. 9/29/14