re: “Full Metal Jacket” - I’ve flipped, I like 2nd half better

I think Kubrick is the greatest director of all time, but FMJ as a whole falls flat. The first half is driven by Ermey's incredible performance and some typically Kubrickian camera work, but it sets up... well, nothing. The second half feels like almost a completely different movie. The film has two messages which are completely contradictory: that boot camp is too harsh and either turns young men into mindless killing machines or drives them crazy if they can't handle it, and then that the reality of war is too overwhelming for those exposed to it to be expected to bear. So which is it? You can't both criticize the system for overpreparing young men for war and also criticize them for sending them into something they aren't prepared for. If the message is supposed to be that there is no way to prepare someone for the reality of war, that would be understandable, but that's not how the movie presents itself.

As much as I love Kubrick, at heart FMJ suffers from not being Apocalypse Now, which is a better movie in every way.