Summary

• The Deer Hunter received critical acclaim for its powerful performances and realistic portrayal of the horrors of war, but it also faced backlash due to historical inaccuracies and a seemingly pro-war message.
• The film's success at the Oscars helped mitigate some controversies, but many still find its scenes, themes, and elements problematic and controversial.
• The Deer Hunter is debatable as an anti-war film, as it focuses more on the consequences of war rather than the war itself, and justifies American soldiers' brutality through portrayals of even more callousness from Vietnamese soldiers.

Although it’s been widely praised as one of the greatest war movies ever made, The Deer Hunter generated its fair share of controversy when it was released in 1978. The Deer Hunter revolves around three American steelworkers – played by Robert De Niro, Christopher Walken, and John Savage – whose lives are irreparably destroyed after being sent to fight in the Vietnam War. The film received critical acclaim for the powerful performances of its cast, director Michael Cimino’s use of striking imagery, and his startlingly realistic portrayal of the horrors of war. But it was also met with some backlash, thanks to its historical inaccuracies and seemingly pro-war message.

The Deer Hunter managed to mitigate some of its controversies by sweeping the Oscars. The film received nine Academy Award nominations – including Meryl Streep’s first ever Oscar nod – and won five: Best Picture, Best Director for Cimino, Best ing Actor for Walken, Best Sound, and Best Film Editing. This awards success allowed The Deer Hunter to go down in film history as a beloved classic. But, due to certain scenes, themes, and elements rubbing people the wrong way, The Deer Hunter was extremely controversial on its initial release – and most of those controversies are still valid today.

RELATED: Is The Deer Hunter Based On A True Story?

6 Is The Deer Hunter An Anti-War Movie?

French New Wave director François Truffaut famously said (via the real-life veteran Oliver Stone. Stanley Kubrick’s Paths of Glory critiques war by focusing on the inhuman bureaucracy of military leadership as opposed to the actual combat itself.

But whether or not The Deer Hunter is an anti-war film is debatable. It justifies its portrayal of the savagery of American soldiers by depicting Vietnamese soldiers with displays of even more callousness and cruelty, making the Americans’ own brutality seem like a means to an end. But, much like Paths of Glory, The Deer Hunter is more interested in the consequences of war than the war itself. The combat scenes in The Deer Hunter are confined to a brief midsection; the majority of the film focuses on the devastating psychological effect of the characters’ experiences on the battlefield, which is hardly an endorsement of war.

5 The Meaning Of The Deer Hunter's "God Bless America" Ending

At the end of The Deer Hunter, after Mike tries and fails to bring Nick home from Vietnam, he and his friends attend Nick’s funeral. Following the service, the group convenes at John’s bar, where the mood is decidedly somber. John starts to sing “God Bless America” as a tribute to Nick, and all the others in. The use of this patriotic song in the final scene might seem to convey a jingoistic pro-America message. But there’s a bittersweet irony in The Deer Hunter’s use of “God Bless America.” They’re asking God to bring love and peace to the nation that sent Nick to Vietnam to die.

4 The Deer Hunter's Exaggerated Villainy Of Vietnamese People

One of the main points of contention with The Deer Hunter’s portrayal of the Vietnam War is its cartoonishly exaggerated depiction of the Vietnamese soldiers’ villainy. The very best war movies, like Saving Private Ryan and Full Metal Jacket, show that there’s good and bad on both sides of any war. But The Deer Hunter is pretty firm in portraying American soldiers as heroes and Vietnamese soldiers as villains. Vietnamese people are depicted as sadists with no capacity for empathy. They laugh hysterically as they torture their prisoners. This is a wildly inaccurate caricature of “the other,” not a sympathetic portrait.

3 The Deer Hunter Was Accused Of Propagandizing America's Involvement In The Vietnam War

The Deer Hunter has been accused of propagandizing the United States’ involvement in the Vietnam War. When the movie was released, just a couple of years after the war had ended, America was deeply divided on the war. Some felt that America’s intervention in the conflict in Vietnam was necessary, while others felt that it was unjustified. Jane Fonda, whose political activism during the Vietnam War earned her the nickname “Hanoi Jane,” called The Deer Hunter a racist movie that reflected the Pentagon’s view of Vietnam, not the reality (via The Guardian). The film’s inaccurate depiction of barbaric Vietnamese soldiers seems to endorse American forces’ intervention to stop them.

2 Michael Cimino Lied About Serving As A Green Beret Medic In Vietnam

Cimino didn’t just generate controversy for his work on The Deer Hunter; he also generated some controversy while he was promoting the film. In an interview with The New York Times’ Leticia Kent (via Vanity Fair), Cimino claimed to have served in Vietnam as a medic with the Green Berets. He said he ed the military around the time of the Tet Offensive in 1968. But Kent couldn’t find anything to corroborate these claims, and it turned out Cimino had lied. He was in the army and trained in Texas, but he was never sent to Vietnam. This misguided act of stolen valor nearly tanked The Deer Hunter’s publicity campaign.

1 The Historical Accuracy Of The Deer Hunter's Russian Roulette Scenes

By far the most iconic – and infamous – scene in The Deer Hunter is when Mike and Nick are captured by the Viet Cong and forced to play Russian roulette. Their captors all place bets as the American P.O.W.s take turns to put a pistol to their head and pull the trigger. This scene depicts the Viet Cong soldiers as inhuman monsters who take sadistic pleasure in forcing their prisoners to play a deadly game of chance. There’s no historical whatsoever of Viet Cong soldiers forcing American soldiers to play Russian roulette; it was entirely made up for the film.

This scene proved to be so controversial that 13 of Vietnam Veterans Against the War protested the Oscars ceremony where The Deer Hunter was being celebrated (via its entirely fictitious Russian roulette scene undermined the real traumas and tragedies that veterans had experienced in Vietnam. However, some critics have defended the Russian roulette scene as a powerful visual metaphor. The random violence of the Russian roulette game symbolizes the senselessness of warfare. A gun with one bullet in the chamber, picking its victims at random, is the perfect image to sum up the randomness with which war itself chooses its victims.

Source: BBC, The Guardian, Vanity Fair, /Film