ARTS
Monday, January 18, 1988
The Michigan Daily
Poge'7
Williams
has
'Morning'
energy
By John Shea
It goes without saying that films
about Vietnam are by and large not
Laughfests. (Of course, such an as-
sertion might be rendered inaccurate
with the citing of John Wayne's The
Green Berets, but snickering at
grotesque propaganda doesn't count.)
For many, the remembrances of the
time and the pain that comes with it
still haunts them as much as it did
when they were "there." And the
films that have emerged from Hol-
lywood depicting the war, in the two
major waves of '78-'79(Coming
Home, The Deer Hunter, Apocalypse
Now ) and '86-'87(Platoon, Full
Metal Jacket, etc.), have largely
served as either bitter political con-
demnations or painful, personal
catharses.
So the making of Good Morning,
Vietnam, a highly charged comedy
starring Robin Williams, is in itself
a bold move. No one has ever at-
tempted to use comedy as a tool to
convey the tragedy that is the Viet-
nam war, and director Barry Levinson
not only tries but succeeds with
haunting effectiveness.
Williams stars as real-life figure
Adrian Cronauer, an irreverent disc
jockey who comes to Saigon in
1965 to take a morning post on the
local Armed Forces Radio network.
} Upon arriving, he finds that he is
expected to read propagandized news
items and play records strictly from
an approved list of "Percy Faith's
Greatest Hits." (For those who are
unfamiliar with this list, artists in-
clude, among others, Perry Como.)
CLASSIFIED ADS
It takes Cronauer all but two sec-
onds to abandon Percy Faith's
playlist; in its place comes a raucous
mix of humorous observations ("it's
0600 hours. What does the 'O' stand
for? 'O' my God it's early!") and
rock 'n' roll that proves to be a big-
ger hit with the enlisted men than
the brass.
Running parallel to the story of
conflict between himself and the
brass are Cronauer's exhausting ef-
forts to capture the attentions and af-
fections of Trinh (Chintara Sukap-
atana, one of Thailand's most hon-
ored actresses, I understand), a young
Vietnamese woman who doesn't
want anything to do with him. He's
slightly discouraged by this, but he
takes consolation in making friends
with her brother Tuan (Tung Thanh
Tran).
Vietnam marks something of a
breakthrough for Robin Williams.
Aside from his masterful perfor-
mance in The World According to
Garp, the comedian has endured a
film career in which he's been hand-
cuffed to character-roles that have re-
stricted his comic genius. Here,
Williams is fortunate enough not
only to be graced with Mitch
Markowitz's strong script but
Levinson's willingness to let the
comedian "do his thing." As a result,
Williams explodes on the screen,
bursting through with the frantic en-
ergy and scathing wit that seems re-
served only for his stand-up routines.
He is an utter delight to watch at the
microphone.
But as the year marches on,
things become more difficult for the
disc jockey. Tensions are rising in
acters drawn with unfinished lines,
making it difficult for us to grab
hold of them. If nothing else, they
need to be more complete to contrast
with Williams.
Levinson, whose other period
pieces include Diner and Tin Men,
captures the growing fear and escala-
tion of the war nicely; playing Louis
Armstrong's soft and mellow "What
a Wonderful World" as Vietnamese
boys are being shot in the streets is
especially disturbing.
Yet, without any empathy for the
characters, we eventually lose inter-
est in the story. We want to see
Williams at the microphone for two
straight hours because he is so bril-
liant. But there is a shade of irony
in that Williams is both the film's
brightest light and darkest detriment;
he's simply too good for the Viet
nam's own good.
r
MICHIGRA
s
0
Adrian Cronauer (Robin Williams, center) surrounded by members of his
company in the new movie 'Good Morning Vietnam.'
v'r"'
-Mass Meeting
/
Saigon and elsewhere; the inevitable
escalation of the war makes it almost
impossible for Cronauer to associate
with Trinh and Tuan. And the brass,
who have never been receptive to
Cronauer's humorous commentaries,
are looking for any excuse to shut
him down, regardless of his popular-
ity.
Yet, there is an absence of
character in the film. We never get a
feel for who Cronauer really is -
and yet this is okay. What we see on
the screen is a man hiding his pain
behind his laughter, preventing both
the characters on the screen and his
audience from getting close to him.
For Cronauer, this distance works.
When Markowitz and Levinson
try this same effect with the
supporting characters, specifically
Sukapatana and Tran, they fail. To
feel anything for these characters, we
need to know more about them;
they, too, are curious enigmas, char-
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