BORN ON THE FOURTH OF JULY (1989)

Oliver Stone’s Born on the Fourth of July, the second film in his ‘Vietnam trilogy’ (following 1986’s Platoon and preceding 1993’s Heaven and Earth), focuses on what it was like for the soldiers coming home after the conflict—when the United States was in turmoil during the Civil Rights movement and anti-war protests. Stone, who himself completed two tours in Southeast Asia, was hired to write the screenplay back in the late 1970s. At the last moment, though, financing fell through and the project was left in limbo for the next decade.

Based on the autobiography of the same name by Ron Kovic, the story details his life growing up in Massapequa, Long Island, who, when he was 19 years old, volunteered to be enlisted into the Marine Corps, just as the war was gaining momentum. In January 1968, during his second tour, Kovic was shot twice during an ambush; the first bullet hitting his foot, and the second going through his right shoulder where it punctured his lung and severed his spinal cord, leaving him paralysed from the chest down. After a long and difficult recovery in the Queens and Bronx veterans’ hospitals—both of which are filthy and vastly under-resourced—Kovic returns to his family home where he tries to come to terms with his life-changing injury. However, after seeing the news on TV, and experiencing first-hand what people think about the war, he gets increasingly disillusioned and starts drinking heavily. Upon returning to the US after travelling to Mexico, Kovic becomes an active anti-war activist and decides to write a memoir about his life and the hardships he faced as a war veteran.

“Don’t you know what it means to me to be a Marine, Dad? Ever since I was a kid I’ve wanted this—I’ve wanted to serve my country—and I want to go. I want to go to Vietnam—and I’ll die there if I have to.” These words, spoken by Cruise playing a young Ron Kovic, just before he heads off to join the Marines, perfectly capture the earnest tone of Stone’s adaptation of Kovic’s story. By taking this true tale of a young all-American teenager, whose life is drastically changed after fighting in Vietnam, the writer-director got another chance to use the medium of film as a tool for criticising the country on how badly it treated its broken veterans, along with the politicians, for getting involved in a long and complicated war when they had no right to be there in the first place.

Before Stone was a film director, he was a successful screenwriter, writing scripts for Alan Parker’s Midnight Express (1978), Conan the Barbarian (1982), and Brian De Palma’s Scarface (1983). However, his journey to screenwriting and directing was a far cry from most American filmmakers of his generation. He began his life living in a world of privilege and wealth: his father, Louis, was a stockbroker and married to Jacqueline, a French woman who grew up in Paris and emigrated to the US in 1946 after meeting Louis when he was fighting in France during Word War II.

While he was in a college-prep school in 1962, his parents divorced, which affected him terribly and eventually led to him joining the army and requesting combat duty in Vietnam. Following two tours, Stone returned to the States where he studied film at New York University—having one Martin Scorsese as one of his lecturers. After graduation, Stone eked out a living as a taxi driver and film production assistant. He then made his first two features, Seizure (1974) and The Hand (1981), in between attempting to get a break with his screenwriting, which finally happened when he was signed to big-time Hollywood producer Peter Guber, off the back of his then unproduced screenplay of Platoon. Guber then introduced Stone to Alan Parker who was looking for a screenwriter for Midnight Express, and the rest is history with the film being a commercial and critical hit: winning a whole raft of awards including the ‘Best Adapted Screenplay’ Academy Award for Stone.

It was around this time that Born on the Fourth of July was published, going on to be a bestseller with Hollywood producer Martin Bregman acquiring the film rights and hiring Stone to co-write the screenplay with Kovic—having Al Pacino on board to play Kovic and William Friedkin (The Exorcist) set to direct. Unfortunately, at the last moment before production began, German financiers backed out, leaving the project where it remained untouched for 10 years. With the success of films centred around the Vietnam War, such as Hal Ashby’s Coming Home (1978) and Michael Cimino’s The Deer Hunter (1978), Hollywood was beginning to realise that there was an audience for films of this nature. Then, when Stone garnered acclaim with the one-two punch of Salvador and Platoon (both from 1986), Universal picked up the script once again, this time giving directing duties to the ‘new hot director of the moment’, with Tom Cruise signing on in the lead role.

Initially, Kovic was hesitant with the news of Cruise playing him, but after meeting with the actor and seeing how committed he was, gradually, he started to warm to the idea.

Cruise spent a year preparing for the part: visiting numerous veterans’ hospitals, reading books about the war, and most importantly, practising being in a wheelchair. He also rehearsed a lot with Kovic during the production, and when filming was completed, he gave Cruise a Bronze Star Medal as a present in praise for his level of commitment.

Credit where it’s due, Cruise is one of the best things about this film; his performance portraying Kovic over a decade is very strong. Starting from a shy and awkward teenager whose main interests lie in sports and girls, you then see him being inspired by Gunnery Sergeant Hayes’ (Tom Berenger) Marine lecture at school to enlist, followed by his time over in Vietnam and his awful experiences that he goes through. Finally, his return to the US in a wheelchair where he struggles with alcohol and depression—before becoming an active anti-war activist. Nothing up to this point in the actor’s career can prepare you for how emotionally raw some of his acting is. Two standout scenes being when he has a drunken fight with his parents, pulling out his catheter as he shouts about his lost manhood and how he was lied to by the US government, the second towards the end of the film when he confesses to the family of the dead soldier he accidentally killed during an ambush when his platoon is attacked.

Aside from Cruise, there’s effective support from the likes of Kyra Sedgwick as Donna, Kovic’s childhood sweetheart who goes on to be an active protestor against the war while she’s at university. Both Raymond J. Barry and Caroline Kava as the parents provide some emotional heft to the scenes. Frank Whaley as fellow veteran and best friend Timmy, puts in a solid performance, as does Willem Dafoe as angry wheelchair-bound veteran Charlie, who meets Kovic while he’s in Mexico.

Outside of the performances, the editing, cinematography, and music, all add some impact to the film; every department turning in first-class duties in their own right. Editors Joe Hutshing and David Brenner were deservedly awarded Academy Awards for their technical prowess, providing the film with a powerful pace and dramatic tension for much of its running time.

One particular sequence that shows their incredible skill and verve is the fateful scene when Kovic’s platoon is ambushed and he’s eventually wounded: starting with a quiet vista of the soldiers walking through a heat haze when suddenly one of them in front is shot through the head that heralds heavy fire all around. As everyone runs for cover, Kovic starts shooting when you see a glimpse of a Vietcong soldier firing his rifle after which the young Marine takes a round in the foot and he falls down in pain. Cut to a close-up of Cruise as he struggles to regain balance and fire back, all the while the camera is moving erratically until he finally takes aim and starts shooting—with bloody carnage and explosions in every direction—and you hear John Williams’ sweeping and powerful music start.

And yes, what a score this is: as with all of Williams’ stunning compositions, this one adds an emotional core to Stone’s movie that both moves and haunts you in equal measure. Taking a string orchestra and single trumpet, Williams proves yet again why he remains head and shoulders above most film composers. Much like Platoon’s composer Georges Delerue’s take on Samuel Barber’s “Adagio for Strings”, this soundtrack’s beautiful music makes the horrifying footage of war feel all the more dramatic and poignant.

Cinematographer Robert Richardson, who’d previously worked on Stone’s Salvador, Platoon, and Wall Street (1987), provides his trademark bright lighting and mix of sharp colours with monochrome to great effect. He received an Oscar nomination for his efforts here but missed out to Freddie Francis for Glory (1989)— however, he won it two years later for Stone’s next film, JFK (1991). Such is his talent, that it’s no surprise that Martin Scorsese and Quentin Tarantino have also used Richardson’s keen skills throughout a lot of their work in recent years.

Upon its release, Born on the Fourth of July was met with decent reviews and healthy box office returns. During its time in cinemas, it made $162M against a budget of $17.2M and went on to win multiple awards, including a ‘Best Director’ Oscar and ‘Best Screenplay’ Golden Globe. Vincent Canby of The New York Times said the film was “the most ambitious non-documentary film yet made about the entire Vietnam experience”, while other leading critics such as Roger Ebert, Gene Siskel, and Peter Travers all praised Cruise’s performance.

Despite this relative success, Born on the Fourth of July is far from perfect; its main weak point lying with the filmmaker’s Achilles heel, which is that the direction and overall narrative are infused with such a level of heavy-handedness that you feel at times you’re being hit over the head with a sledgehammer. Don’t get me wrong, I think a lot of the director’s films make for compelling viewing, but perhaps because Stone had also fought in Vietnam, he’d become too close to Kovic and his source material for him to present the story with a level of objectivity that was necessary to put this in the realms of true greatness.

I was lucky to first see this in the cinema, where I remember being moved by Cruise’s stellar acting and impressed with the film’s aforementioned technical merits—but viewed today, while still recognising it has moments of genuine flair and strong performances, I feel that the end result feels overwrought and even overly sentimental. Still highly recommended if you’ve never seen it, but the director’s best films, for me anyway, are Salvador and Platoon, which are as powerful today as they were nearly 40 years ago.

USA | 1989 | 145 MINUTES | 2:35:1 | COLOUR | ENGLISH • SPANISH

Cast & Crew

director: Oliver Stone.
writers: Oliver Stone & Ron Kovic (based on the autobiography by Ron Kovic).
starring: Tom Cruise, Kyra Sedgwick, Raymond J. Barry, Jerry Levine, Frank Whaley, Ed Lauter, Caroline Kava & Willem Dafoe.