As a straight forward war movie Full Metal Jacket is immensely popular, yet artistically it's one of Kubrick's least understood films. There are several reasons for this. The mega box office and critical success of Oliver Stone's Platoon preceded Full Metal Jacket's release by almost a full year. Several inferior Vietnam war films were quickly being released in an attempt to cash in on Platoon's success, and it was under these circumstances that Full Metal Jacket made it's debut. Fortunately, Kubrick's film had two obvious things to offer that Platoon lacked. The first was its hilarious dialogue, especially drill instructor Hartman's rapid-fire insults, and second was its dynamic and varied action set pieces. It also lacked the obvious and well-trodden "horrors of war" emphasis and moral assertions usually associated with acclaimed war films (Platoon pulled this off well, but Apocalypse Now had already been there and back almost twenty years earlier). In fact Full Metal Jacket's pacing and style are more akin to the highly commercial and entertaining WW2 action film The Dirty Dozen.

The one aspect of Full Metal Jacket that has brought artistic praise is its no holds barred critique of military brainwashing. Again this was lacking in Oliver Stone's Platoon and helped distance the two films from each other. The physical and emotional pummeling of the lovable Private Leonard Lawrence into a psychotic and suicidal wreck is thoroughly convincing and packs just as strong an emotional punch as any of Platoon's themes. If the cadet training section of Full Metal Jacket had itself been fleshed out into a standalone movie then the critics would have applauded loudly and in unison.

Instead Kubrick shifts the story straight into the chaos of the Vietnam war, as if we had finished watching one film and then started another. The film maintains its humour, but drags us through a confusing narrative mess that is very entertaining, but seemingly absent of purpose. Joker's final dilemma, in which he must find the strength to perform the mercy killing of a female NVA sniper, is strangely unsatisfying. It doesn't seem to justify the rest of the war zone narrative.

This is not unusual in Kubrick's work. Many of his films have stirred up controversy and negative emotion, while refusing to offer obvious moral condolence – A Clockwork Orange and Lolita being the most obvious examples. The key factor is that Kubrick didn't make films to comfort his audience. His intention was to challenge us – to present us with philosophical puzzles and dilemmas. He challenges us to earn narrative condolences by flexing our mental muscles and thinking deeply about the film experience.

It hard to explained fully what Kubrick's hidden narrative to be in the Full Metal Jacket. For one, as obvious as it it, about the brainwashing the military do to strip away not only your identity but also your will... You may argued that is necessary in war but looking at it in a different angle, you will see there's plenty of subliminal messages from advertisement or government telling us how to dress, how to behave, how to travel, where to eat etc...As it appears choice is only an illusion. You're not actually making a free choice but a given choice.

(information from Rob Agerwww.collativelearning.com)

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