American Films
After the Vietnam War, Hollywood films presented criticism for the U.S. intervention in Vietnam. This approach has been the leading narrative of how American filmmakers produce films about the Vietnam War. In these films, two contradictory perspectives about the war emerge through American soldier characters, which are divided into either the anti-war or the war enthusiast supporters. This narrative was maintained in Hollywood production in the late 1970s to the 1990s.
Furthermore, the Watergate scandals in the 1970s and military failure in Vietnam increased public suspicion of and hostility toward the government. The Vietnam Syndrome indicates the breakdown in the Vietnam War for its responsibilities in warfare. In the late of the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, the U.S. was involved in other conflicts with the Middle East and the Gulf War (1900 – 1991) victory helped the military forces to gain back the confidence. This success allowed the American public to come out of the shadow of the Vietnam Syndrome. The Vietnam War films have made its comeback after the September 11th attacks as a reaction to the Vietnam Syndrome in the U.S. foreign policy toward the Middle East. This time, films about the Vietnam War are meant to remind and alert the U.S. government from making any similar mistakes that occurred in the Vietnam War toward the U.S. military engagement in Iraq (2003 – 2011).
Platoon (1986)
Apocalypse Now Redux (2001)
We Were Soldiers (2002)