Heaven & Earth **** (1993, Hiep Thi Le, Tommy Lee Jones, Haing S. Ngor, Joan Chen, Debbie Reynolds) – Classic Movie Review 2075

Writer-director Oliver Stone’s honourable, bold and brave 1993 conclusion to his Vietnam trilogy started by Platoon and Born on the Fourth of July sees him trying to view to see conflict from the Vietnamese side and through the eyes of a woman.

Stone won Best Director Oscars for the first two films but failed to repeat the success with Heaven and Earth, which was conspicuously and totally ignored by Academy voters. However, it is a considerable achievement and a must-see for anyone who is following the Oliver Stone collection of retro stories.

With his screenplay based on Le Ly Hayslip’s two autobiographical books (When Heaven and Earth Changed Places and Child of War Woman of Peace) about her experiences during and after the Vietnam War, Stone tells the dark and disturbing story of what happens to her after her tranquil, traditional rice farming village is blasted by the war.

Stone’s impressive film is a huge achievement on both the emotional and intellectual levels, but received none of the praise lavished on its predecessors. However, it is a thoughtful, concerned, lovingly crafted movie, with persuasive, in-depth performances from radiant newcomer Hiep Thi Le (as Le Ly) and veteran Tommy Lee Jones, who excels in a tour-de-force of playing the dying embers of a burnt-out case of an American Marine.

Victimised by both sides, Le Ly is raped by the Vietcong soldiers, then captured and tortured by the South Vietnamese. Earning a living as a black marketeer and bargirl, she meets and is wooed by Steve Butler (Tommy Lee Jones), a war-haunted Gunnery Sergeant in the United States Marine Corps, who brings her back to America as his bride.

[Spoiler alert] Their life together begins well but, just when it seems happiness is finally in Le Ly’s grasp, Steve succumbs to the terrible pressures of readjusting to civilian life. Years of killing and life in the bush have destroyed Steve, who becomes uncontrollably violent. Despite Le Ly’s attempts to reconcile with him, their relationship collapses and tragedy ensues.

After the searingly depicted scenes of battle and pain of war in Vietnam, there is an abrupt shift of gear to the semi-parodic American sequences, which are sharp and telling. Only composer Kitaro’s way too lush, over- insistent music and Robert Richardson’s eye-distractingly pretty cinematography seem to strike wrong notes and work against the realism of the movie. However, that didn’t stop Kitaro winning the 1993 Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score or Richardson being nominated for Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography by the American Society of Cinematographers.

But, otherwise, the fired-up Stone movingly draws out his anti-war, emotional-healing and Buddhist regeneration themes perfectly in this desperately underrated and neglected movie. It was disastrous at the box office, costing  $33 million and earning back only $5,865,000 in the States.

Also in the cast are Haing S Ngor (as Papa), Joan Chen (as Mama), Dale Dye, Conchata Ferrell, Dustin Nguyen and Debbie Reynolds.

Hiep Thi Le (1971–2017).

Hiep Thi Le died on 19 December 2017 of stomach cancer, aged 46.

© Derek Winnert 2015 Classic Movie Review 2075

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