Barracks drama, written for the stage by David Rabe, directed by Robert Altman, about soldiers due to be sent to Vietnam. The camera never goes outdoors, though it looks out the windows a lot, and stays active in other ways too. It does not always stay attentive, however, to the current topic of discussion. And with so much talk, some of it indecipherable, the viewer does not need encouragement to let his mind wander. There are many flashes of good acting, and many of overly "sensitive" and overly "expressive." Guy Boyd and George Dzundza are the most consistently good, although least consistently present, as a couple of drunken veteran officers. (The drunkenness tends to obliterate sensitivity and expressiveness.) Sensitivity is most apt to assert itself in the inordinate consideration given to is-he-or-isn't-he questions about a wide-eyed rookie named Richie, who wears a Greek fisherman's cap, reads poetry by Sylvia Plath and a critical study on Ingmar Bergman, and says things like: "Wit is my domain." With Matthew Modine, Michael Wright, Mitchell Lichtenstein, and David Alan Grier. (1983) — Duncan Shepherd
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