The set up:

The Viet Nam war has been going on for a while now, but Chris has only just spurned his bougeois lifestyle to enlist into the infantry. He arrives in Viet Nam to shoot gooks People’s Liberation Armed Forces soldiers.

Characters:

• Elias - an experienced veteran who never let his murderousness get out of hand, or in the way of his need to love. He’s hard, he’s wiry, and yet soft-spoken with a winning smile.
• Barnes - an even more experienced soldier. He is hard as a rock, and likes doing it rough and barely legal. He hates Elias because Elias is firm but fair, alert but not alarmed. He has a giant, but strangely alluring, scar traversing his entire face.
• Chris - a rookie soldier, a cherry. A good-for-nuthin’ dough-ball with lots to learn. He finds Elias intriguing.
• Bunny - A white racist soldier. Everyone hopes he dies.
• Barely Legal Twink Officer - he’s a replacement for someone twice his age and 4 times his experience. Someone would frag him, but they don’t have to. His incompetence will get them all killed sooner than later.
• Ho Chi Mihn - leader of the Viet Namese revolution. A Leninist.
• Black Nationalist Soldier 1, 2, 3 - They’re black, do you really need a description? Black men always die for the white lieutnant, don’t they? They want to be in with Whitey. If you really care about them, imagine buff, oiled, leather wearing versions of King, Malcolm and Eldridge. Not that the white male adolescent audience will identify this cultural reference.

SCENE 1

Exposition

Lots of expositional montage of soldiers carrying things, packing weapons and generally being equal to the exhausting task of setting up base camp. Show Chris being heli-landed into the camp. He looks disoriented. Nobody told him there’d be big black men in the infantry. On his side in the infantry! What has he gotten himself into?

Film it in New Zealand, they’ll never know.

SCENE 2

In which Chris is wounded in a firefight

Elias leads about 10 men, including Chris, into the jungle. They quietly stalk the NFL, who wear leaves tied to their hats. After a long wait, Chris sees NFL, and starts trying to shoot them. His gun clicks, but doesn’t fire bullets. Other soldiers join the shooting.

CHRIS: Die mutherfuckers!
SOLDIER1: Kill all these fucking VC!
SOLDIER2: Die die die! This is for the spectre of my dead father!
SOLDIER3: This is for my inability to achieve an erection! Fuckers!

Elias is quietly enraged, disciplined. He looks hot in camo makeup.

BLACK NATIONALIST SOLDIER 1 (shouting to Chris): Cherry! Cherry boy! (CHRIS DOESN’T TURN AROUND) Chris!? Chris, why aren’t you shooting? C’mon man!
BLACK NATIONALIST SOLDIER 1 (TO Black Nationalist Soldier 2): Fucking cherry, going to get us all fucking killed.
Chris looks down at his “piece”
ELIAS (To Chris): Hey man, your safety’s on. Let me help you.
Reaches down to touch Chris’ “piece”. The gun works now. Chris fires a long burst.
ELIAS (To Chris): Be careful not to blow it all at once. Keep it in burst mode.
CHRIS (Souting to NFL): Ho Chi Mihn sucks dead dicks!

Montage. Men in the jungle, running. Its dark. There is fire being exchanged between the NFL and the yankee soldiers. There’s wet mud on everything.

Chris is shot. He thinks he’s dying.

CHRIS (to Elias): I’m wounded. Look at my open wound, tell me the truth. I’m dying, ain’t I?
ELIAS: You’re not gonna die. That’s the nicest wound I’ve seen since I been out in the jungle. Now hold on, I’m gonna go and get the motherfucker who did this to you. When I get my hands on him, I’m gonna observe military law to the utmost. He’ll die a slow death once he’s been handed over to South Vietnamese torturers. Don’t you worry.
Elias runs into the jungle

SCENE 3

In which Chris learns that Marijuana is only part of Elias’ intrigue.

Chris and Elias are watching the stars together. Moonlight plays over their faces. Chris has a bandage over part of his neck.

CHRIS: Its beautiful out here. (PAUSE) Except for the mosquitoes, you wouldn’t guess that this country was infected with communism. Its the only sign, that and the commies …
ELIAS (INTERRUPTING HIM): Do you always talk such shit out of your full and pouting mouth?
CHRIS: I’m a privileged white boy from the upper middle classes. I don’t even know what I’m doing here, I didn’t enlist in a drug-induced haze, because I’ve never done drugs.
ELIAS: Well there’s your problem. (PAUSE) How’s that gash in your neck?
CHRIS: It still hurts, it hurts me so bad, even after a week of light duties. I hate those gook NFL mutherfuckers.

Background, subtle, Ho Chi Minh stands in NFL style camoflague, covered in leaves and branches, observing

Elias is rolling a joint
ELIAS: We can fix all that.
AUDIO: a rifle is cocked.
Elias raises his rifle to Chris
ELIAS: Suck on this.
Chris suspiciously willing to suck on the end of a rifle, puts his mouth on the end of Elias’ rifle. He looks deeply at Elias.

AUDIO: “Go ask Alice” by Jefferson Airplane” starts to play
Elias takes a drag on his joint, and exhales into the breach of the rifle. Chris sucks in the sticky and hot marijuana fumes. He feels light headed. Elias leans into Chris, and finds the bandage on his neck. He lifts the bandage, and through the gash, he sucks the marijuana smoke after its been filtered through Chris’ body

ELIAS: Feel good?
CHRIS: Hmm. My gash doesn’t hurt as much.
ELIAS: Feeling good is good enough.

Elias and Chris lean together towards the ground, out of camera, camera rises slightly into night sky, showing Ho’s benevolent gaze over them

SCENE 3A

In which we learn other attitudes to marijuana use - not everyone in the army was a stone cold fag smoker.

AUDIO: “Go ask Alice” cuts on beat into “We don’t smoke Marijuana”, record skip, “Its Raining men (Hallilujah)
Scene: Interior, Bivoujac
BUNNY (With “playboy bunny” ears on helmet): Those damn stoners are smoking that shit up outside. You know, the gooks put stuff in the grass to turn us into fags.
BLACK NATIONALIST SOLDIER 3: Yeah Bunny you don’t need that, because you is a stone cold man lover already
BUNNY: And I don’t smoke nothing neither
BLACK NATIONALIST SOLDIER 3: See, that’s what I mean, white men are using that shit to keep the black man going down, down, down, but one day, the black man is going to rise up strong and hard, and we ain’t gunna be on the bottom no more, we’ll be tops.
BARNES: Cut that shit, the barely legal lieutenant’s coming over.

Barely Legal Twink Officer enters the room to check on “the men”. He is uncomfortable in this environment, out of his class and out of his element.
BUNNY (Biting through something phallic, perhaps a massive bratwurst): Hey LT, check this out.
Bunny hands Barely Legal Twink Officer the chewed on chunk of bratwurst
BARELY LEGAL TWINK OFFICER: Uh, thanks, I’ll send this home.
BLACK NATIONALIST SOLDIER 3: Hey, why don’t you play around with Bunny and me?
Barnes looks at Barely Legal Twink Officer. Barnes is holding something, we aren’t sure what.
BARELY LEGAL TWINK OFFICER: Uh, nah, I wouldn’t want to be raped by you guys.

SCENE 4

Exposition - getting ready for a mission into the jungle.

The men are heavy-hearted. They fear the jungle because it reminds them of a giant, dank and wet vagina. It reminds them of their mothers sacrifices for them, and their scorn for her. It reminds them of date-raping schoolgirls in highschool, and fucking poverty-stricken whores whenever they get any leave. They always beat the prices down. They are aware that men use women with their vaginas as their battlegrounds, their victorylands, their spoils of war. This is the dark vagina that might take revenge, from which they might never return. The jungle is pregnant with NFL forces. A Vagina Dentata. Through a cross fade or mirror shot, Ho’s balding head seems to crown the beginning of the dark foliage, at the crest of two joining tree’s branches. The ominous clitoris of revolution watches them.

SCENE 5

In which everything goes to shit, and Barnes takes the men into his own hands.

Scene: outside, in the jungle. There’s a firefight going on.

BARNES (SHOUTING TO BARELY LEGAL TWINK OFFICER): Look what your fucked up big-gun firemission has done to all those boys going down out there. You had to cover them with that heavy load. Ho Chi Mihn is going to suck their dead dicks after this, you fucking barely legal fuck! I’m going to spank you so hard if we ever get back to camp!
Cut to BARELY LEGAL TWINK OFFICER’s face. He’s stunned into paralysis. He’s almost crying. He only likes it when the violence is pretend violence, not real violence. He only likes it when he’s the one handing out the spankings.

BARNES: Now let me show you how a real man does it.
Barnes grabs the radio, and takes control. He starts barking co-ordinates, and orders to everyone. BARELY LEGAL TWINK OFFICER shinks into the background.

SCENE 5A

In which Elias leaves Chris to go on a rear ambush mission

Same scene as in 5. Outdoors, jungle, firefight in progress. Barnes is still in command. Elias approaches him with a proposition
ELIAS (To Barnes): BARNES! I’ve found some deep foxy holes in our rear. The gooks NFL will get men in our holes, cutting us off from our 2 Platoon. When they’re in our rear they’ll give it to us hard and good, and 2 Platoon will lay all their loads out on us. We’ll be cut up in the cross-fire.
BARNES: Bullshit Elias. I’m dealing with Twinkies’ mistakes here and you’re playing me for a cherry straight out of reform school?
ELIAS: I’ve seen it happen an Ia Drang in ‘66. We went out for some poon respectable female company, and the gooks NFL gave it to us deep in our rear. They fucked us good and hard. I need two men, I can give it back to them when they try to come through our treeline.
Barnes doesn’t want to agree with Elias, but knows he’s right
BARNES: Ok, you go. Take, Bunny and Black Nationalist Soldier 2 with you.
ELIAS: We’ll get them from behind.
Elias turns to go
CHRIS (TO Elias): Let me go too.
ELIAS (TO Chris): No, you wait for me here. You’ve gotta watch yourself with that gash.
Elias smiles warmly, and leans into Chris tenderly through the mud on his face. Chris smiles, sadly, he thinks Elias might not come back
ELIAS: Don’t worry. I’ll be back before you can say “Ho Chi Mihn sucks dead dicks”.
Elias runs into the jungle with Bunny and Black Nationalist Soldier 2

SCENE 5B

In which Elias is murdered.

Barnes is stalking through the jungle, looking for something. He is alert, masculine, tough. When he sees Elias, he lowers his rifle slightly, and smiles. Then he raises it again.

BARNES (TO ELIAS): I never liked you.
ELIAS: Yes you did, Scarface. You liked me too much. Remember?
Elias smiles, but also raises his gun
BARNES: I remember how I got this scar. You aren’t coming near me with hot wax again.
ELIAS: You keen?
Elias remembers something. His enthusiasm suddenly wanes
ELIAS: Chris … he’s waiting for me.
BARNES: I told him to go back to camp, that I’d find you.
Barnes shoots Elias with a burst from his rifle. Elias falls down, not quite dead but clearly dying.
Exeunt Barnes
AUDIO: Arpeggio for strings
Elias stumbles forward, arms in crucifixion style before collapsing backwards
Enter Ho Chi Minh, in rubber tyre shoes and a bone polyester leisure suit
Ho Chi Minh ministers to Elias, prompting Elias to cradle Ho’s head in his lap as he dies
ELIAS (softly, fading): Ho Chi Minh… sucks…

SCENE 6

In which the firefight dissolves into an orgy of communism.

Scene - same as 5A. Jungle, firefight.
OVER THE RADIO: Oh my god oh my god. Gooks NFL have overwhelmed the bunker. They’ve penetrated command! There’s shit blowing out everywhere! Oh my god oh god! Its all over the walls!
Barnes runs into shot. Chris looks at him searchingly
OVER THE RADIO: I want you call in every load you’ve got on my position. Oh my god! Oh my god! You’ve gotta dump it all on me now, we don’t have much time.
BARNES: Elias is dead. (PAUSE, ANNOYED) I know you lost your precious Elias to Ho, but I’m not waiting all day, you gonna finish me off, or what?
Chris is clearly angry. His body tenses, as he approaches Barnes. His gun is raised
CHRIS: Yes.
Chris tackles Barnes. They toussle, entwining, and slowly slide out of shot
OVER THE RADIO: Oh my god! You’ve gotta saturate my position now! Rain down glory glory on me now! Oh my god! Ho Chi Mihn, oh! Oh Ho, oh Ho! Oh yes!

FADE TO BLACK

Credits

• The author would like to thank military expert, Gunnery Drill Sergent Major General Quarters (DSP, Fourier Transform and BAR), for his guidance and expert advice on dialogue.
• I would also like to thank Oliver Stone, who made the the film “Platoon”. Without you, none of this would ever have happened.

Author’s note

Ok, I like film. I love popular culture, and I love to analyse what’s being pumped into my head. But sometimes analysis isn’t enough. Sometimes you need a montage!

I recently saw the film “Platoon” for the first time, and I was very excited by the gay overtones in the relationship between Elias and Chris. I kept wondering why it was that no-one had said to me “watch this film - its about man-lovin’ in the war”. Why was it that only I could see that Chris sucking on Elias’ gun as big, sexy come-on? Is there really that much denial about homosexuality, that you can see it, but you can’t name it? So that when you see it, you’ll just think “oh, they’re just men being men together, nothing gay about that”. But there is something gay about it, something yearning and fulsome that lives silently in the film. Its something I wanted to give full reign to. I often find myself watching a film and asking “when are these two men going to fuck? When are they going on their second date? When does ’suck on my gun’ become ’suck on my penis’?”. This is to say nothing of the titilating, neutered treatment that woman-woman sexuality gets in the movies. At least when its two men, they can almost get there; with women its just a shaddow-play to titilate the audience: a quick kiss before the dicks are back on the scene.

But what if all those double-entendres about guns, shooting a load into someone, and “really being in the shit” were exposed? Some of the lines and scenes I’ve used here were actually in the film “Platoon”. See if you can pick them out.

I felt a bit dirty at times when writing this. I’ve often wondered how a person can sit down to write a film about warfare, and write scenes where the men are sexist pricks to everyone. Where the racism flows freely, and the only forbidden element is love. “Oh no, too baku! Too baku!”.

I think that the “anti-war” war film is an excuse to indulge in these pastimes. How could I write the word “gook” to talk about the Viet Namese? How could I write about black soldiers? Should I make them exoticly ultra-spiritual, or ultra-tough, or just men? Does Ho Chi Mihn really suck dead dicks? At what point am I as a spoof-writer indulging in my need to write the word “motherfucker”, and the fantasy that one day a tall, muscular man might yell my words to an imagined enemy? Obviously no-one’s ever going to perform “Splatoon!”, but someone did perform “Platoon”, they did perform “Full Metal Jacket”, they did yell “die gook motherfucker”, and some of the audience did not get the joke.

The war film allows the writer to present a false moral conundrum to the audience. “Good” and “Evil” are replaced by “Evil” and the “Lesser Evil”. In “Platoon”, some of the men are painted as morally evil. Barnes is presented as a hard man, the incarnation of war and a war criminal. In contrast, others are presented as being good: Chris gives up his bourgeois lifestyle to be an infantryman when he could’ve been an officer. Elias’ character is kind and fair. He smokes pot with the men, and observes the rules of war when killing. But in actual fact Elias is a killer. They are all killers, invaders and rapists. That Chris stops the rape of a small girl by his comrades is an attempt to ameliorate the worst of human fantasy. We are taken to the brink, but pulled back by the false morality of the character. Its an attempt to excuse war, to soften its harsh edges for the audience, who look on cheering for Chris. Chris who is not a rapist, but a killer.