Streamers

Streams, a film by Robert Altman, based on the play by David Rabe, is an example of cinematic theater at its best. Although the camera remains within the barracks for the duration of the film, the viewer never wishes the film to expand to the outside. The drama within each troubled character is intense enough and expansive enough to satisfy any inveterate theater goer. Altman is wise enough to allow Rabe's script to speak for itself, without a lot of cinematic pyrotechnics. The actors are uniformly superb, the situations believable, and the themes thereby made clear. The overriding theme is, of course, the tension all men feel while waiting to be shipped into battle. In this case, anticipation of the coming battle is made more agonizing by the very nature of the conflict in Vietnam: one is always aware of the anti-war sentifments which, though unspoken in the military, nevertheless have seeped into the minds of the men about to be sacrificed. Secondly, there is the theme of selfishness, of using people for one's own pleasure and of the disaster that can often create in the lives of both user and victim.

This film revolves around some soldiers in a stateside barracks circa mid-1960s. The soldiers are a mix of black, white, gay, and straight. Their interaction, and the violence that results form the plot of the story. I found the plot line dramatic and compelling, but not necessarily an accurate representation of "how it was back then". Having been a lieutenant and platoon leader in the Army of the 1970's, I can say that a soldier who flaunted his homosexuality in the barrcks (as the character of Ritchie does in the film), would almost certainly risk being assaulted and/or seriously injured by his fellow soldiers. Barracks life does have it's humor and pathos, but the introduction of an openly homosexual soldier would have consequence far more serious than the psycho-drama portayed in the film.Despite my disagreement with the premise of Streamers, I have a personal connection with this film. I originally saw Steamers on the stage in 1979, right before heading to West Germany as a young US Army MP lieutenant. Several months later, as an officer in the 272nd MP Company in Mannheim, myself and my MPs were called to a barracks. A barracks with blood on the floor, and soldiers stabbed/cut up/beat up. I walked in and said the same line as the MP Lieutenant in Streamers; "What's going on here?". Suddenly I was the MP Lieutenant in this film (not literally)! This movie (perhaps even more than the original stage version) is spot on in showing the sudden violence that used to be a fact of barracks life in the Army into the early 1980'sI also felt I knew the two drunken sergeants. Older combat veteran NCOs were a staple of platoon life into the end of 80's (when almost all retired, voluntarily or not), and were unforgettable (drunk or sober). The scene where the two sergeants sing the song that is the title of the film actually brought a lump to my throat.Veterans of the Army of the 1960/70's may wish to concentrate, as I did, on the accurate feel of barracks life, and the interaction between older, veteran NCOs and younger soldiers over the themes of homosexuality and race linked to violence.I rated this as 4 stars out of 5 only because the DVD does not have any features other than the movie and a commentary feature (no close captioning or chapter selection).

I stumbled across this film on a lazy weekend a few years ago while watching the television and have been waiting for the DVD ever since. While those who are inclined will take from this film what they identify most with, I feel like there is something here for even those who do not identify with alternative gender identity's. As a veteran who never went to war I connected with the characters in a way that is inherently subjective. I found the interconnectedness of the situation these characters found themselves to be in to be most interesting, the boredom of military life without all the distractions civilian life has to offer in a training environment, and proverbial melting pot of class, race, gender (not sex), and social status. This was as close to the real (feel) of a military training environment as I have found in film yet. That is not to say there are not big differences, but the social situation is what I am referring to. The acting in this film is superb, and I think it touches on some important socio-political issues of the referenced time period, namely the controversial war and its draft, rampant substance abuse within the U.S. Army during that time including training facilities, acceptance of homosexual identity/behavior (coming to an important pass in the Obama admistration policy as I write this), race relations, class issues (such as upper-middle class from Manhattan enlist while the working class and black were drafted).Ultimately this film is intentionally left open to interpretation, and I do not feel like it was an open criticism of war or the military, simply commentary. And to those who feel like the sergeants acting like fools was not realistic enough, I encourage you to spend time off with those in the enlisted ranks and I think your in for a surprise.

Man, is there any other modern director with so many small indie gems out there? I don't think so. This ones takes aim at war, and it does a pretty fantastic job at giving gays in the military their due order WAY before the topic was all that popular.Like most of his films, Altman was way ahead of his time in regard to natural dialog and thematic tensions that are relevant to society. This is from the David Rabe play and it's his own adaptation.This might not be your favorite Altman film, but it's a wonderful look at the service and all the issues in Vietnam. Not an easy film to watch at times, but it offers so much humanity that one would be stupid not to see it once. Even Ebert gave this relatively lost film 4 stars on its debut. Altman shot in only 18 days in Dallas and released in Fall of 1983. You really do owe it to yourself to track down a couple of the smaller films Altman directed, as I find the more I watch the more I love from this auteur.