1/25: The Anderson Platoon (1967)

In 1967 "The Anderson Platoon" won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. This award winning movie is my focus in day 2 of my 34 days of Oscar.

There are many differing opinions on what makes a documentary good, interesting or informative. For me, it is how well it tells the story is told. All documentaries are trying to tell a story, and usually present it from one point of view - the filmmakers. In my opinion, the ones that avoid hitting are the better ones.

"The Anderson Platoon", the first Vietnam movie to win an Academy Award, is the story of a platoon in Vietnam led by 24yr old Lt. Joseph Anderson. It was filmed by French War cameraman Pierre Schoendoerffer. He was with the platoon from August 1, 1965 until October of 1966. He was right in the trenches with the soldiers and was able to capture the day to day life of a soldier in Vietnam. He shows the mucking through the jungle, the aftermath of a firefight, even the down time one soldier in the platoon has in Saigon.

I understand that the format of a documentary has changed in many ways since 1967, but I can't help feeling that a little more narration would have helped this movie a lot. There is an introduction to the soldiers of the platoon, but the following 40 minutes have no narration at all. I would have loved to know what was going on and where the soldiers were going and what their mission was. The footage seems to be edited together in no real order either. There is a scene of a helicopter crash cut into a scene of the soldiers having a meal and I would have loved to know the significance (if any) this had. I did enjoy a few scenes, but after being introduced to the soldiers we never returned to see what happened to them. I understand that there is another documentary that was made in 1989 called Reminiscence that checks in with the survivors of "The Anderson Platoon" but no mention of survivors, other than Lt. Anderson, is made in this film.

Overall, I would give "The Anderson Platoon" 2 out of 5 stars. It was a little too short (54 minutes) and although what I saw was interesting, I wasn't sure what was happening a lot of the time.