Films that never got their due...

[Firefly]

Nope, they were in the Pines, balisong all the way. He just rolled it open smooth rather than put on a Benihana knife show.

This alone merits a rewatch.

I have only seen a Puerto Rican and a Filipino do a balisong that smooth

Both chicks.

[SteyrAUG]

This alone merits a rewatch.

I have only seen a Puerto Rican and a Filipino do a balisong that smooth

Both chicks.

Real Filipinos open it behind their leg so you don't yet know it's going to be a knife fight.

[Grand58742]

It’s worth it to track down the original book.

The battle of Hue and the subsequent time at Khe Sanh were epic. A little weird at points but a good weird. The sequel The Phantom Blooper was also good. Joker ends up captured by the VC and sorta switches sides and totes a camo painted M79, a sidefolder VZ 58, and wears Black pajamas and shoots at an Air Cav helo with a 40MM. It sounds worse than it was. Almost comedic. I like that one line “As I fired a grenade at the big Yellow and Black Air Cav insignia; it occurred to me this was the first time in 100 years that anyone in my family fired a shot at Federal troops”

Full Metal Jacket the movie sucks and Kubrick deserves a kick in the balls.

Plus that bit about Ermey doing his own lines was a lie. Everything the gunnery sergeant says is taken word for word for word from the book.

There used to be a Gustav Hasford fansite where you could read his stories and also how he wanted Dale Dye to be the advisor and hated Ermey.
Him and Dye were in the same outfit and were friends. Also how Kubrick tried to gyp him out of writing credit.

Plus the female sniper used an SKS in the book and was wiped out by an M60......tank.

For the record, I met Ermey one time at a Glock match and he was a nice guy.

I never realized it was based on a book.

I met Ermey a long time ago at Peterson AFB. He was traipsing through Colorado and stopped for gas on Base. Ended up signing autographs and talking with people for about 20 minutes after he finished filling his tank.

[Grand58742]

Given that the film liberally hijacked "The Boys in Company C" I agree. Not only that R. Lee Ermy completely eclipsed everyone else in the film with Pvt. Pyle running a close second. Once those two were gone, who in the film is left that we actually care about? Joker just isn't that interesting and engaging, Matthew Modine is often annoying as he is anything else. The sniper scene with Doc J and 8 Ball is the only other powerful scene in the film. Other than Cowboy I doubt most people could even name any of the other characters in the film.

I thought Modine did an exceptional job in Memphis Belle.

Another underrated war film that never really "go its due" was The Tuskegee Airmen. All star cast that showed how hard those guys had it.

I much preferred that one to Redtails.

[Firefly]

I never realized it was based on a book.

I met Ermey a long time ago at Peterson AFB. He was traipsing through Colorado and stopped for gas on Base. Ended up signing autographs and talking with people for about 20 minutes after he finished filling his tank.

The Short Timers and The Phantom Blooper respectively by Gustav Hasford.

Kubrick tried to totally displace billing with more acknowledgment to Michael Herr who only contributed to apocryphal bit about the 60 gunner shooting women and children.

It was intended to be a trilogy where Joker gets sick of the America he’d come home to and how changed he’d become. He was approached by CIA spooks in the VA hospital and decided to give his backpay to his kid sister and use his press pass before they expired to go back to Vietnam and see if he could find the young Vietnamese girl teacher he’d become infatuated with and see if he could “make sense” of it.

Like the Star Wars of Vietnam (my analogy, not his)

He had a lot of angst but not in an Oliver Stone way.

Another notable line was where he took the Tokarev pistol out of his AWOL bag at home and said “It’s good to have a friend again”

In fact earlier in the book Phantom Blooper he uses the Tokarev to mozambique drill an NVA charging him with a spiker he quick draws from a chinese made shoulder sling.

I wish he would have lived to write his last part. He was a smartass and a sartrarian and had a sick sense of humor.

[SteyrAUG]

I thought Modine did an exceptional job in Memphis Belle.

Another underrated war film that never really "go its due" was The Tuskegee Airmen. All star cast that showed how hard those guys had it.

I much preferred that one to Redtails.

Agree with all of that. Especially Tuskegee Airmen kicking the crap out of Redtails.

[ramairthree]

Can you translate that for me?

There was not a lot of equipment change in twenty years.
If you were in Ranger Bn, SF, LRSS, Pathfinder Platoon, etc. you had the same M16A1s, CAR 15s, M1911A1s, M60s, jungle fatigues, jungle boots, Bonnie caps, Load carrying equipment, etc. as someone in Vietnam.

In that era, Battalion Commanders were likely 101st Airborne Division, or other still existing unit, veterans from Vietnam. Your senior NCOS, or less senior NCOs if they had a break in service, were LRRP/Ranger Company and SF vets from Vietnam.

Being in a Ranger or other similar unit post Grenada and pre Panama sucked because there was no war on. The way crye wearing, ball cap sporting, sneaker bootie, bearded operator types is the current coolness,
Was the the way nomex clad, big porn stash operators were the coolness prior to that,
Is how the cool factor was then for fatigue wearing jungle warrior types.

It may be hard for many to get,
But some SOF type in the 1980s in his jungle fatigues and boots with his M60 or CAR 15 was, well, jealous of not having a war in the jungle to go to for a year like Vietnam.

[26 Inf]

The Short Timers and The Phantom Blooper respectively by Gustav Hasford.

$55.00 is cheapest on Amazon for 'The Short-Timers' and $20.00 for 'The Phantom Blooper.'

Since I'd want to read them in order, any suggestions on a source?