WTF Happened to Full Metal Jacket?

Last Updated on November 21, 2023

If we’re talking about the holy trinity of Vietnam War movies, there’s no doubt about which ones reign supreme. Indeed, Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now, Oliver Stone’s Platoon, and Stanley Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket will forever be regarded as the most viscerally harrowing glimpses into the physical and psychological toll that the Vietnam War had on a generation of young American men. Yet, despite the popularity of Full Metal Jacket, one can’t help but wonder how much more successful the movie would have been if weren’t released in the shadow of Platoon’s smashing success. Remember, not only did Platoon win four Oscars in 1987, including Best Picture, but it was released in theaters just five months before Full Metal Jacket. As a result, Kubrick’s undeniable classic sort of got lost in the shuffle and never received the contemporaneous accolades and attention it deserved.

Of course, always ahead of the curve and far beyond his time, Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket has only gained appreciation and popularity over the years, with many even asserting that it’s the absolute best Vietnam War movie of all time. The truth is, Kubrick began working on Full Metal Jacket long before Platoon was in production and has more in common with Apocalypse Now than Oliver Stone’s Oscar-winning classic. We’ll explain exactly how in this video, along with the film’s development, casting process, principal photography, on-set anecdotes, injuries, and accidents, and of course, Kubrick’s painstaking process that arguably made him the greatest living filmmaker of all time. We’re about to find out WTF Happened to Full Metal Jacket!