I served my time in Korea. Five years after I came back old time school mates of mine were being drafted for Vietnam. I later heard their stories over quarts of beer and doobies. This movie IS their story. I was sitting on my couch watching the big ambush scene and it scared the hell out of me in my own living room. The scene where Brian Dennehy tells Lt. Catuto that 19 year old kids in Korea checked their rifle sights by shooting down Korean farmers came home to me. My brother, who fought from the first of the Korean war through the Chosen battle, told me the same thing. This movie has it all. The boredom, the terror, the frustration, the slaughter, the sadness, the futility. And it is real. It starts out slow but when it kicks in it gives no quarter, cuts no slack and takes no prisoners. If you ever carried a rifle in a combat zone at night alone you can relate to it. But even if you have no recollection of the Vietnam war era you can still sense the reality.
