the audience applauded

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

Titled after what one soldier says about there being only a "thin red line between the sane and mad", this World War II drama focuses on a young soldier who decides to distance himself as much as possible from his platoon's ruthless sergeant - a decision that gradually leads to him becoming a cold-blooded killer. Keir Dullea and Jack Warden are superb as the young upstart and sergeant respectively with an especially memorable final couple of scenes that capture just how unstable Dullea has become. Warden also has a touching bit in which he repeats his motto regarded dead soldiers ("it's only meat") in a new context. With none of the other characters fleshed out in any depth, one's appreciation of the film is likely to rest entirely on how much interest one takes in the dynamics between Warden and Dullea, which admittedly overshadow the historical backdrop and battlefield action. Edited with nightmarish flashback sequences and full of memorable dialogue (Warden warning of the dangers of letting his privates "start thinking" rather just following orders), this was though clearly intended as a less traditional war movie. As far as dialogue-heavy war movies go, 'The Thin Red Line' might have nothing on Samuel Fuller's masterpieces of the prior decade, but it deserves to be mentioned in the same breath at least as a film that taps into the psychology of war.

Detailing the battle on the South Pacific Island of Guadalcanal in 1943 and the Americans' final success over the Japanese, this is a most poignant and underestimated war film. Seen through the narrator, one of the American soldiers, the film's strength lies in its depiction of the harshness, misery, madness, and yet also the depth of humanity, on both sides. There are no winners here. Superb acting all round from the plethora of well-know actors, this extraordinary film leaves you pondering about life long after the credits have rolled on by. It reminds me how fortunate I am not to have been forced to be a soldier as I could not do what so many have been, are still in parts of the world, made to do on behalf of their governments, or renegade armies. May we be forgiven for all the suffering humankind has meted out on other fellow human beings.

Like some other commenters, I saw the 1998 version before seeing this version. I had expected a somewhat jingoistic war film, but was surprised that this turned out to be superior to the 1998 remake in every way but one. Of course the one aspect that was lesser was the depiction of graphic violence, and that was only due to the changing times and audience, and modern film effects that can show things more realistically in graphic fashion. However, I do not consider this a positive, but only stating that the technical ability to show graphic violence has improved. I would say that the story in this one is more engaging, more concise and without losing the effect of alienation that both try to convey, and in fact that effect is much more visible here in this depiction. I found the acting to be solid and less melodramatic than the 1998 version, and the soldiers actions all ring true to what would have been going on in WW II at Guadacanal, without hystrionics. It's quite interesting that this version, coming right before the Vietnam era would be cynical about war but also considerably mindful of the necessity of the particular war it depicts and of the need for the soldiers to do as they did. Whereas the post-Vietnam 1998 version is also cynical, yet much more so, showing the military as a bumbling bureaucracy of sorts and attempting to depict the battle as pointless, extending that depiction to the war in general, and it actually is an unstated allegory about Vietnam. I would say that the 1998 film boasts a production group fairly unaware of the overall reality of WW II, and still stuck in the miasma of Vietnam.

For those who have read the James Jones novel, you should know that that the production team for this movie paid little heed to the original text. And, that's a shame, because the true horror and insanity of war as described by Jones is missing: instead, what you see is an attempt at a psychological explanation in the guise of one of the characters, Private Doll (Keir Dullea).Briefly, the story concentrates upon Doll – a somewhat nervous but seemingly normal soldier at first -- showing how he gradually degenerates into a killing machine who not only wants to kill the enemy – in this case, the Japanese garrison at Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands – but eventually the soldiers of his own company as well. War is hell, as we know, but is that a likely result from the stress of battle and a crazy desire to survive at any cost? Apparently so, according to the screenwriter and director.Inexplicably, top sergeant Welch (Jack Warden), who in the novel really is as crazy as hell, is portrayed instead as a tough – but sincere -- no-nonsense veteran (who's character for the movie is no doubt modeled on Duke Wayne's portrayal of Sergeant Stryker in The Sands of Iwo Jima, [1949]) who pushes Doll to the limits, goading him all the time in order to help make Doll a better soldier and thus survive the war. Does he succeed? You be the judge, should you see the movie.The other characters of the novel are virtually ignored, except for the tussle between Col. Tall (James Philbrook) and Capt. Stone (Ray Daley) that rams home the point that nice guys always finish last. Like I said, war is hell... And, in a daring departure for the times, the overt homosexuality between Doll and Fife in the novel is actually hinted at, visually and in the dialog, on quiet a few occasions.I liked the black and white cinematography; it brought back memories of the Iwo Jima classic and Duke Wayne. The overall production, however, lacked the realism of that, and other classics (All Quiet on the Western Front [1930], Paths of Glory [1957], The Rats of Tobruk [1944] and others), the special effects were hardly special, and the overall effect was one of a cheap production done over a few weeks somewhere in southern California (none of the terrain even vaguely resembled a tropical rain forest as exists at Gaudalcanal).For the times, the production was about equal to any B-movie you'd see at a Saturday afternoon cinema or drive-in, and about as exciting. As a piece of Hollywood production history, it's worth seeing, I guess. For a more serious and far superior production, however, see Terence Malick's presentation of The Thin Red Line from 1998.