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The story
As a young and naive recruit in Vietnam, Chris Taylor faces a moral crisis when confronted with the horrors of war and the duality of man.
What critics & audiences say
Tomatometer89%Fresh#64 of 98 winnersIMDb8.0478K votes#37 of 98 winners
Metacritic92/ 100#18 of 93 winners
TMDB7.7/ 10
Famous lines
I think now, looking back, we did not fight the enemy, we fought ourselves, and the enemy was in us.
Shut up! Shut up, and take the pain! TAKE THE PAIN!
Me, I don't need this shit. I am reality. There's the way it ought to be, and there's the way it is.
The first casualty of war is innocence.
Chris: Come on! You really think so? Us?
Elias: We've been kicking other people's asses for so long I figure it's about time we got ours kicked.
Somebody once wrote, "Hell is the impossibility of reason." That's what this place feels like. Hell.
For the record, it's my call. Dump everything you got left on my pos. … It's a lovely fucking war. Bravo Six out.
Elias: Feel good?
Chris: Yeah, it feels good. I got no pain in my neck now.
Elias: Feelin' good's good enough.
All you got to do is make it out of here. It's all gravy, everyday the rest of your life, gravy.
Everybody gotta die some time, Red.
Quotes via Wikiquote
Fun facts
- Oliver Stone's earliest version of the story, a script called Break, was sent to Jim Morrison in hopes he would star; Morrison never replied, but he had the script with him when he died in Paris, and his manager later returned it to Stone.Wikipedia · Development
- The shoot in the Philippines nearly collapsed amid the political upheaval around Ferdinand Marcos, but filming began as scheduled just two days after Marcos fled the country.Wikipedia · Filming
- Before filming, Vietnam veteran Dale Dye put Charlie Sheen, Willem Dafoe, Johnny Depp, Forest Whitaker and the rest of the cast through a 30-day boot camp with forced marches, rationed food and water, and blanks fired to keep exhausted actors awake.Wikipedia · Filming
- Platoon was the first Hollywood film written and directed by a veteran of the Vietnam War, and Oliver Stone wrote it partly to counter the vision of the war in John Wayne's The Green Berets.Wikipedia · Lead
- James Woods turned down the role of Sergeant Barnes, later joking that he "couldn't face going into another jungle" with Oliver Stone; Mickey Rourke, Emilio Estevez and Kevin Costner were also considered.Wikipedia · Casting
- Keanu Reeves turned down the lead role of Chris Taylor because of the film's violence, and Kyle MacLachlan also passed; Charlie Sheen said he got the part thanks to Willem Dafoe's nod of approval.Wikipedia · Casting
- Made for about $6 million, Platoon grossed over $138 million domestically and became the third highest-grossing domestic film of 1986.Wikipedia · Lead
- The Department of Defense refused to support the production because of its depiction of American war crimes, so the film used equipment belonging to the Armed Forces of the Philippines instead.Wikipedia · Development
- Oliver Stone makes a cameo as a battalion commander in the final battle, which was based on the real New Year's Day Battle of 1968 that Stone himself fought in.Wikipedia · Casting
- Merle Haggard's "Okie from Muskogee" plays in the film even though the story is set in 1967 and the song was not released until 1969.Wikipedia · Soundtrack