Sands of Iwo Jima 1949
The John Wayne WWII film Ron Kovic watched as a Long Island kid; Wayne's Sgt. Stryker death scene fed Kovic's love of the military.
The Big Picture · Discussion
8. I Love America | Do We Get to Win This Time?
August 25, 2023/ 71 min/ Brian Raftery
The Vietnam-on-film series closes out the boom: Born on the Fourth of July, Running on Empty and Dead Presidents move the war home, then the Gulf War and Saving Private Ryan send Hollywood back to WWII.
42 films across 1 segment.
AI-generated This episode was transcribed and analyzed with AI models. The matches aren't perfect — expect the occasional misheard title or a link to the wrong film.
How Hollywood Made the Vietnam WarThe end of the boom, from Born on the Fourth of July to Dead Presidents
The Green Berets 1968
Wayne's pro-war Vietnam picture, which a wounded Kovic saw on a hospital pass and rejected: 'This is not the way it was.'
Coming Home 1978
Jane Fonda's Oscar winner, which Bruce Gilbert says Kovic's speeches helped inspire ('I lost my body to regain my mind').
Born on the Fourth of July 1989
Oliver Stone's adaptation of Kovic's memoir, a decade in the making after an Al Pacino version collapsed. Tom Cruise took a pay cut and used a wheelchair for months; won Stone a second directing Oscar and made $70M.
The Exorcist 1973
Cited for William Friedkin, first attached to direct the aborted late-70s Born on the Fourth of July.
The French Connection 1971
Friedkin's other 70s landmark, named alongside The Exorcist.
Running on Empty 1988
Naomi Foner's script about ex-radicals underground since bombing a napalm lab; Sidney Lumet directed River Phoenix, Judd Hirsch and Christine Lahti. Golden Globe for Foner, Oscar nods for her and Phoenix.
12 Angry Men 1957
Named as a Lumet classic.
Dog Day Afternoon 1975
Named as a Lumet classic.
Midnight Express 1978
Stone's screenwriting Oscar, part of the recap of what he did while Born on the Fourth of July stalled.
Salvador 1986
Stone's film that, per the narrator, gave him a 'James Woods-sized headache.'
Platoon 1986
Stone's breakthrough; Le Ly Hayslip handed out flyers outside her San Diego theater asking about Vietnamese dead, and it helped clear the way for Heaven and Earth.
Wall Street 1987
Stone's 'greed is good' hit, his other post-Platoon success.
The Deer Hunter 1978
Cited alongside Coming Home as the earlier wave of tragedy-driven Vietnam movies.
The Exterminator 1980
Example of the 80s damaged-vet action drama that treated Vietnam vets as ticking time bombs.
The Park Is Mine 1985
Named in the same breath as The Exterminator: a vet who no longer fits into society and pushes back violently.
Risky Business 1983
Cruise's breakout; the episode's own correction notes it came out in 1983, not 1982.
Top Gun 1986
The jingoistic Navy-pilot blockbuster that made Stone wary of casting Cruise as Kovic.
Dogfight 1991
Nancy Savoca's gentle 1963-set romance; River Phoenix as Marine Birdlace, Lili Taylor as Rose. Savoca cut it as the Gulf War began and feared history repeating.
The Doors 1991
Stone's rock biopic; Hayslip made him promise Heaven and Earth would have none of its sex.
Heaven and Earth 1993
The last film of Stone's Vietnam trilogy, from Le Ly Hayslip's memoir; Hiep Thi Le leads opposite Tommy Lee Jones. A $23M epic that audiences and critics ignored ('I got slaughtered').
Forrest Gump 1994
Robert Zemeckis's six-Oscar hit; Tom Hanks as Gump, Gary Sinise as Lieutenant Dan, whose arc echoes Kovic's before ending happy.
Menace II Society 1993
Albert and Allen Hughes's surprise-hit LA crime debut, made in their early 20s.
Dead Presidents 1995
The Hughes brothers' bleak Bronx-vet heist drama, inspired by Wallace Terry's oral history Bloods; Larenz Tate as Anthony, Chris Tucker, Keith David, Freddy Rodriguez, Martin Sheen as the judge. The boom's explosive finale.
Apocalypse Now 1979
The poster on the Hughes brothers' studio wall; Martin Sheen's cameo as the sentencing judge nods to his lead role here.
Saving Private Ryan 1998
Spielberg's D-Day film that the narrator watched with two WWII vets; near half a billion worldwide, it spearheaded Hollywood's WWII revival.
The Longest Day 1962
The John Wayne WWII hit one of those vets had been an extra in.
The Thin Red Line 1998
Terrence Malick's Pacific-theater drama, part of the WWII revival Ryan set off.
Pearl Harbor 2001
Named among the big-budget, A-list WWII films that followed Saving Private Ryan.
Windtalkers 2002
Named among the WWII revival films.
Hart's War 2002
Named among the WWII revival films.
For the Boys 1991
One of the pricey 90s Vietnam dramas that underperformed as audiences lost interest.
The War 1994
Another pricey Vietnam-era drama that underperformed.
Flight of the Intruder 1991
A Vietnam drama that downright bombed.
The Fog of War 2003
Cited as a tough-minded Vietnam documentary from the last 20 years.
Tropic Thunder 2008
Cited as a later Vietnam-adjacent dark comedy.
Da 5 Bloods 2020
Spike Lee's later Vietnam drama, named as a rare recent return to the war.
The Hurt Locker 2008
Named among the post-9/11 war hits, contrasted with waning interest in Vietnam.
American Sniper 2014
Named among the post-9/11 war hits.
Lone Survivor 2013
Named among the post-9/11 war hits.
Zero Dark Thirty 2012
Named among the post-9/11 war hits.
The Best Years of Our Lives 1946
The WWII-homecoming film Cue Chin's father translated for her in a Hanoi movie palace; it closes the series.
Not films filtered out: TV, games, ads
TV Band of BrothersLaw & Order
Books BloodsWhen Heaven and Earth Changed Places
Ads Netflix FIFA World Cup Launch EditionCarvanaFanDuelBoar's HeadIcons ClubThis Blew UpGamblers