Movie Review: Good Morning Vietnam!

Thumbs up.

I put off seeing this movie because Vietnam movies are usually heavy.  This isn't a heavy movie, but it's not exactly accurate to call it a light movie either.  Robin Williams is sent to Vietnam to be a DJ for army radio.  There is a collection of good guys, bad guys, and of course a pretty girl.  There are many jokes, and awesome classic rock.  (I kept thinking: "I need to get this soundtrack!")

Ultimately, it's the standard Robin Williams format: a setup in which Williams does a lot of improvisation, most of which is side-splittingly funny.  There are more serious undertones that start out quietly but build to the point where he can't ignore them any more, and then he switches and becomes serious (at least most of the time).  These challenges are dealt with, and things at the end are happy.  Williams gets that comical look on his face, makes a few more jokes, happy music plays and the credits roll.

At the same time, two things stand out.  The first is the Vietnam setting.  Now we're in another similar conflict and the parallels are striking.  I will be the first one to argue that Iraq is not Vietnam.  Statistically, a GI lasted about five minutes in the field in Vietnam.  I'm not joking.  Five minutes.  On average.  Which means about half of the GI's lasted LESS than five minutes.  We lost more soldiers in the first few months of Vietnam than we have lost after several years in Iraq.  There has been no national draft, and our government has not used our own soldiers to shoot at our own civilians in peaceful demonstrations.

Moreover, the South Vietnamese government was inept at best.  In Iraq we are building a much stronger government that is much more likely to last when we pull out.

Nevertheless, there are similarities.  Vietnam was perhaps the first "asymmetrical" war, where it was hard to tell who was a friend.  Another strong theme in Good Morning Vietnam is the frustration felt by Williams at the end, when he is faced with a Vietnamese boy whom he thought was his friend, but was actually a terrorist.  Williams thought he had been working for the good of the Vietnamese people, but the boy didn't see it that way.  "I am not the enemy," the boy says.  "You are the enemy."  It is difficult to make the case that we are helping a country, when that country's own citizens see us as the enemy.

The other lasting nugget of value from the movie was the trademark line.  I found myself wanting to holler it on the street this morning: "GOOD MORNING SAN FRANCISCO!!!"  It's fun.  It's worth noting how Williams uses that line throughout the movie.  His first day on the job, he's jetlagged, exausted, and has very little idea what he's doing.  His second day on the job, he's been heckled and impeded.  His third day on the job, he had just survived a terrorist bombing.  His joyful cry is not heartfelt; instead, it is a rallying cry.  He is sending a message, to himself and to others, that in spite of adversity, we still have the strength to prevail.  I find that to be a useful thing, even if I'm not deployed overseas.