Full-Metal-Jacketing, or Masculinity in the Making

Abstract

Loren Baritz's Backfire, a provocative study of American involvement in Vietnam, opens with the assertion that the Vietnam war worked as a glass that enlarged aspects of some of the ways we, as Americans, think and act.2 Like the war it portrays, Stanley Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket also works as a magnifying glass, enlarging one aspect of American culture in particular: the making of the American man and war hero. Like Baritz, Kubrick explores the reasons behind American involvement in Vietnam. He does so, however, by focusing our attention primarily on the cultural conditioning of the men who fought in the war. By revealing the profound analogies between the making of the marine and the making of masculinity in general, Kubrick unmasks the true meaning of patriarchy and its motivation. The standards of manhood promulgated by the military permeate all of society and are broadcast by its institutions.