"Vietnam Requiem" strikes such a powerful punch in our hearts and minds atfer the end credits roll, and all those tough/sad/terrible
stories told by its main characters are stick to the memory, that you can go with two emotions: you can cry or you can feel angry at nearly
everything that is shared by our main characters in this documentary or about the system of war. This is the story of five Vietnam war veterans whose
lives not only suffered and survived through the horrors of war but when it was all over they all shared the same fate back in America: they were incarcerated
criminal felons. When Coppola described "Apocalypse Now" as "My movie is not about the Vietnam, IT IS Vietnam!" he exaggerated a great deal as
we know how fantastic, mystical that masterpiece was, very unreal; Bill Couturié and Jonas McCord special here IS Vietnam, with no holds barred, and the
kind of aftermath that wasn't deserved of proud military men who served their country in an unjust war/cause.
It opens with the following statement, later on used on Paul Hardcastle's song "19": "In World War II the average age of the combat
soldier was 26. In Vietnam it is was 19." It's the story of five 19-year-olds Albert Allen 'Pee Wee' Dobbs, James McAllister, Raymond Baker, Duane Maybee
and Kenneth Patterson, all young men in their prime who followed in the many different fields of the military, dreaming about all the goods such
a career would give them, fulfilling their needs, truly becoming men and serving their country in an apparent great cause in the Vietnam. Many
can imagine stories of battles like the ones depicted by Hollywood, but the real horror is beyond imaginable, and each men tell harrowing,
shocking stories that I don't need to describe, you must hear it from them. There are a few images from many Vietnam archives, and Dobbs appears
in a few of them, you can see him in action.
But we're not immersed in the war, there's the kinds of lives they all lived and faced when they returned home; and throughout the piece
Couturie & McCord make insightful parallels between World War II (all about glories) and Vietnam (all about dishonor), which was easily perceived,
but not necessarily fully understood by most people. That's what hits hard viewers because the downer stories, albeit somewhat similar to what many
common man face (substance abuse, reckless behavior, family violence), gets a wider and darker aspect when you add that they fought a war and
seen things most of us never dreamed of. Their chance of returning to civilian life and becoming outstanding citizens felt like something impossible,
with PTSD's taking everything from them. It's either getting killed, committing suicide, becoming homeless, living in Veterans hospitals or going to
jail, as our heroes here, committing crimes they would never expect of doing when they were 19.
But there's a dark yet very heartfelt moment I need to share, and it comes from Dobbs brother when he recalls a suicide attempt his brother
was planning of using a shotgun. His reply was "If you wanna do it, please use something less noisy cause I need to sleep". It sounds harsh,
but it convinced a tear-eyed Dobbs to not do anything and simply go back to sleep. Hard lives can provide those things that can make us stop
and rethink everything.
I could go on and on with this movie, so I'll leave some final emotions, a final analysis. I couldn't cry (but almost), just stayed frozen,
silent and reflecting about all I heard and seen. Then came the thoughts of anger, contempt and outrage, as I was reminded about the war, the
system that allowed such unnecessary device (though scholars defend its purpose, sometimes useful) of creating killing machines that
can never go back to their natural state, it ages them very badly, injured and scared, and traumatized, and few are the winners. In this particular
conflict, a significant first American loss, those soldiers return were a second war, at home, with nearly no chances of winning. The American
military complex during Vietnam War had gains and losses that sort of balances itself; but the veterans and American society has lost plenty. Scars that hasn't healed. 10/10.
