I think he just felt like he needed to do to accomplish the mission, or whatever other cliche there was.
Remember when the two guys are blown up in the bunker by a booby trap. He's sitting there looking sad and reflecting and Sheen catches him doing so. He offers the LT to play a game of cards with them. And I would have been pissed if the commanding officer gave wrong coordinates getting 2 men killed and 2 wounded.
[deleted]
He was a product of the environment. You see Taylor dramatic change and see the dehumanizing effects of war on him and that is just for a short period of time. Barnes has been there years so he has REALLY lost that. I think he believes in winning the war, no matter what he has to do. Contrary to popular opinion, he actually cared a great deal about his soldiers, even Oliver Stone said so. Maybe not soldiers from the other clique but his PERSONAL soldiers.
Haters gonna hate
Fortunately I've never had to serve in a war (I'm not a military type). But if I did...I wouldn't want someone like Barnes on my team. I just wouldn't trust him, whether I was in his clique or not.
Great character, though. He and Defoe really nailed their parts and were the real stars of this film.
----------------
Remembering Space Shuttle Columbia: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERBr0lKIwOs
I have and believe me it is FAR FAR FAR worse than most people could imagine.
I would have liked him as my Sarge. He knows what he is doing and having a leader like that makes you fight harder and more confident. You can see how distraught he was when those 2 were killed at the VC base camp by the booby trap. Like you said though, if I knew he had murdered one of our own there is no way in hell I could trust him or want him to lead me.
Haters gonna hate
" Contrary to popular opinion, he actually cared a great deal about his soldiers, even Oliver Stone said so."
Notice how pissed he becomes when even the new meat is killed in the beginning.
He really cared for his men, black or white - he was no racist. His reaction when they find Manny is strong and emotional.
share[deleted]
If you asked Elias this question as Taylor just about did, the night before that fateful encounter, he would have said no and responded as many of the above posters have.
But I think we are asked to believe that during the events that transpire during this movie, he slips over the edge and loses his grip on reality, doing and sanctioning deeds that Elias, Taylor, their ilk and hopefully us, would agree, should never have occurred.
Therefore have to agree with J-Street 9 when commenting thus:
"He really cared for his men"
"Not all of them. Not any who got in his way. He was as dangerous as the VC."
[deleted]
The mmmother****ers.....
One of my favorite lines in the film.
If this was a movie about a war waged by any country other than the US, and if Barnes had been the exact same person except as a German or a Japanese or anyone else, no one would even ask that stupid question.
Sig under construction
THIS.
He is a cruel and selfish murderer.
Please excuse my terrible redaction, english is not my native language.
Exactly! When nazis or japanese soldiers behave this way, they're evil. When an american soldier does it he's a "victim" of war.
pure idiocy.
By the time the movie started (or at least after Sandy, Sal, and Manny die) he was. But I don't think that the character was always like that. I don't think accomplishing the mission was anything he cared all that much about, I just think that he was so hollow by that point in time in his life that he didn't know how to do anything except for fight the war.
shareBarnes was a evil man. He may have been a competent field sergeant but the thing that really makes him a bad character is the killing of Elias. He disagreed with Elias on a lot of stuff, but at the end of the day, he killed a man on his own side for absolutely no reason other than he didn't like him. Completely unforgiveable thing to do as a military person. I know a lot of people like his character, but from the first time I saw this movie I couldn't stand Barnes, reminds me of bully bosses that play by there own rules.
shareElias wasn't a man on his own side. Elias was ready to turn in one of his own for doing his damn job. Killing the enemy. There was absolutely no ambiguity with that village. It was straight up VC. Underground tunnels, holes, weapons, and enough food to feed an army (pun intended). Barnes had every right to waste anyone there to extract information and for what they did to one of Barnes men. They were flat out lying and dicking him around. A warzone is no place to be siding with villagers over your own platoon. The people Elias was trying to save were probably the same ones who ran him down and shot him to death.
shareSince the first time i watched the movie I usually skip that village scene because it overshadows the movie in such a sad way and stays with me afterwords. I always used to sympathize with Elias in that scene, however what you are saying is probably the truth, very difficult to make rational decisions there i guess, especially when you are angry, sad, drunk, high, tired, injured or all..
We saw the same in Saving private Ryan with the German they let go and later ends up killing one of them; and recently that situation in Lone Survivor with the shepherds.
There were kids and old ladies in that village but on the other hand your friend has just been killed, pfff I think everyone would be torn apart in a situation like that, turning the Platoon on each other.
That was real? I saw that movie, I thought it was bullsh*t
What you're saying relates more to Charlie Sheen's scene with the guy hopping than it does when Barnes shot that lady. He wasn't on a power trip, getting emotional, or cracking up under the pressure. He was facing reality and dealing with it. Barnes was trying to save future lives by interrogating the people (enemies), who were very loyal, proud, and putting up a stone wall. If killing someone would get them to talk, there should be no hesitation, nor someone trying to question him about it. Why would anyone side with a villager who condones and therefore is responsible for killing one of your men, and possibly many others on your side.
War is hell. We all know this, but somethings are unavoidable. But it's something total different when you've got people like Elias falling out of rank, and trying to turn on someone who is supposed to cover him and get his back.
Yeah, maybe I'm just to sentimental when it comes to old ladies and retards..
When Barnes met Elias later in the jungle, Elias smiles, then his smile fades and seconds later Barnes shoots him. It is very contradicting the emotions in that scene... Was Elias really happy to see Barnes there and did he think they would get back together? (very naive yes?)
That was real? I saw that movie, I thought it was bullsh*t
So, I take it Elias, the rat, is a bad person and Barnes is the good guy, in your mind?
I read Stone had the My Lai massacre in mind when he wrote the village scene.
To most, I hope, the cold blooded murder of villagers in THEIR country by Americans is BAD. (also the rape of children or does the lose of a friend justify that, too?)
You don't believe in following orders or the law? You think losing friends or trying to obtain information gives a soldier a right to murder someone?
It's a FACT, soldiers just prior to going to Vietnam were trained about the treatment of Vietnamese. And they were given a Code of Conduct card to carry at all times in Nam.
During the training we were told even if a prisoner jeopardized our mission and you was ordered to kill him, you are guilty of murderer and could be executed.
Some of us know better and would be ashamed of their actions. Not try to justify it.
Agreed. That scene in the village immediately brought to mind the My Lai Massacre. Also, it's previously been mentioned in this thread that the village was clearly cooperating with the Viet Cong. However, at the start of the scene the man in the village explained through the interpreter that they have no other choice and that the VC come in and take anything and give whatever orders they want. While the villagers of Mai Lai had been cooperating with the VC, they did so at gun point.
shareElias wasn't a bad guy. That much is obvious.
I think it's too much to call one good and the other bad. Both were very three dimensional characters.
Barnes takes the death of the members of the platoon very seriously. That shows up throughout the film. Hence his viciousness on a village that was, as far as any of them could tell, undeniably NVA friendly. Yeah he did overreact. He even knows it, but I'll get to that.
Barnes murder of Elias was definitely a criminal act, but I wouldn't call it an evil act. From what I could tell of the character, He felt Elias was just TOO goody goody. Elias decision to push for a court martial and continue to do so, in Barnes eyes, was not the real issue he should have been focusing on. Fighting the war was. There's more but it's hard to explain. In short, Barnes wasn't just eliminating a monkey on his back, he was removing a weak link from the platoon.
His big speech in the happy hut later reflects a lot of what I've said, and really shows how he views the world. In my opinion, he was seriously regretful of the things he has done and who he has, in his eyes, been forced to become. This is why he offers them the chance to kill him, and then gets angry when they all back down. He opened himself up to them, and it isn't until he closes himself again that Chris attacks. I imagine if he had taken Barnes on his offer immediately, he wouldn't have gotten whipped for it.
Ultimately, I don't consider Barnes a bad person. I feel he was definitely on the darker end of the morality scale by this point in the movie, but genuinely felt that he had to be. He was a case of "he who fights monsters...." His job was to help win the war, and he was going to do what he had to do to win it, but at the same time, he hated doing what he had to do. It's why he is in no way upset when Chris kills him at the end of the film. It ended his own pain.
Barnes was going to be court-martialed because Elias did not support him and stood up to him about what happened at the village. It was about more than mutual dislike between the characters.
shareI agree that the characters are allegorical and that's kind of what I don't like about it. It's almost like Stone thought that the war itself isn't dramatic enough, you need a bunch of allegories to spice it up a bit.
Also I'm sure there were shootings of one's own troops in the Vietnam war, fraggings, but there was just a little too much of that in Platoon. I would have preferred a more realistic war tale.
[deleted]
Not sure about that last bit; As I recall Stone did multiple tours: As an MP; As an artilleryman & as a squaddie in the 25th Infantry division. I had heard that his 'Barnes/Elias Conflict' was him 'ruminating' what would happen if the squad leaders from his two different units 'had a fight'...as for 'fragging'--I'm sure it happened in the rear & it probably had more of a self preservation issue in the field-IE: Goof-off pointman, dangerously incompetent squadleader & whatnot...still the 'fragging' could be overstated sometimes:
I recall a 'poser/author' with the pen-name 'cincinatus'. He wrote about Vietnam a lot in the early 1970s & purported to have been 'in country'. He expounded a lot on 'fragging'-so much so, that he gave the impression that a large percentage of officer & NCO losses were caused by it. Part of what made me feel he was telling tall tales was the comments on the number of casualties that Helicopter pilots suffered. He 'opined' since most pilots were 'warrant officers', the mechanics could easily sabotage the helicopter to do away with 'lifers'-kind of overlooking the fact that many warrants were barely out of high school & sort of 'hot rod racers' in their outlook rather than by the book officers...
My mom had explained to me that, to her, when you see Barnes "reflecting" after the men are injured, he is really reflecting on killing Manny, part of why he is startled when he catches Chris looking at him (they find Manny right after this). HE is the psychopath killer in this movie. He hates the enemy. He kills Manny in order to stir up the men and make them more ruthless. He wants to make them into killers like him. He wants to make them hate the enemy like he does. After he kills Manny and gives them the speech, many of them are ripe to "do the whole town". They don't question his tactics. He definitely goes over the top at this point. Killing the woman, and such. I had always thought this to be so. Everyone I tell this to thinks I am crazy. I just took my mother for her word.
shareYou mother may be right. I also think Oliver Stone took a page of history from My Lai and applied it to the killing of Manny. Note the soldiers in My Lai were in the heat of the Tet Offensive and one of their own soldiers had just been killed in a way similar to Manny. They had taken several losses and they were highly agitated by the time they got to My Lai, they were just ticking time bombs ready to kill everyone in that village.
1. Tet Offensive - My Lai
2. Manny getting butchered - Platoon version of My Lai
That's a very good topic to think about.I believe that Stone wanted to draw a portrait of an evil person-product of the environment,as other users have already mentioned but,at the same time,we are presented with one of the most complex characters of the movie.This man is totally obsessed with pain and death.Even from the beginning of the film,when he shouts ''take the pain'' to a wounded troop,he seems like he is addressing to himself about something HE is battling for.Elias' rationality and kindness of thinking just block him and confuse him.(''When the machine break down,we break down'').But obsessions aside,he has not been able to cope with the idea of death.Nobody who has,would repeatedly beg for others to relief him of his existence.He is one of the most powerful characters I have seen in a war movie,although I,too,hated him,enough times.
Every army needs a person like Barnes. We can all judge him but that is the fact which only few people are willing to admit.
shareThat reminds me of a quote I read from a personal narrative on a late war battle fought by the 101st ABD in the A-Shau Valley (The Battle of Firebase Ripcord 1970): one of the companies got a new officer to lead them. He happened to be a Veteran Special Forces NCO who was promoted to Leutenant just for the job. Still recovering from a leg wound he would, l limp around their position working on the defenses. He would tell them that, 'If you guys want to survive the war, you must only think of the war & nothing else.'
Why can't you wretched prey creatures understand that the Universe doesn't owe you anything!?
Every army needs a person like Barnes.
What do you expect to see from a man so long in fighting jungle (anti)guerrilla warfare? A musketeer with gentleman´s code of conduct? Lol. Army needs soldiers who will do the job right and Barnes did every task given to him flawlessly. Not only he did the job flawlessly he was a real mofo out there. We can be hypocritical and judge him but we all know the enemy feared him with reason. The other pair of gloves are that later everybody are washing hands from a guy like that and judging him. He was surrounded with bunch of incompetent idiots and people absolutely not motivated for warfare nor life of a soldier. A platoon of men like Barnes and you can win any war you want. You know it and I know it.
shareWhat do you expect to see from a man so long in fighting jungle (anti)guerrilla warfare?
he was a real mofo out there.
Barnes is the type of person Kurtz is talking about in AN. Get rid of the people who don't want to slaughter and kill like Defoe. Just give me Barnes types. Kill a ton of people and they will submit.
America didn't have the stomach for it. This wasn't like Korea where you have a real liberal government and a crazy nutjob being used as a middle man for Mao. We outright invaded a country that wanted to be our ally against the Chinese. All for money.
[deleted]
Every army needs a person like Barnes.