As a young and naive recruit in Vietnam, Chris Taylor faces a moral crisis when confronted with the horrors of war and the duality of man.
A celebration of love and creative inspiration takes place in the infamous, gaudy and glamorous Parisian nightclub, at the cusp of the 20th century. A young poet, who is plunged into the heady world of Moulin Rouge, begins a passionate affair with the club's most notorious and beautiful star.
A pragmatic U.S. Marine observes the dehumanizing effects the U.S.-Vietnam War has on his fellow recruits from their brutal boot camp training to the bloody street fighting in Hue.
The staff of a Korean War field hospital use humor and hijinks to keep their sanity in the face of the horror of war.
Manhattan explores how the life of a middle-aged television writer dating a teenage girl is further complicated when he falls in love with his best friend's mistress.
When talented young writer Elizabeth Wurtzel earns a scholarship to Harvard, she sees it as her chance to escape the pressures of her working-class background and concentrate on her true talent. But what starts out so promising leads to self-destructive behavior and paralyzing depression that reflects an entire generation's struggle to navigate the effects of divorce, drugs, sex, and high expectations.
A young American soldier, rendered in pseudocoma from an artillery shell from WWI, recalls his life leading up to that point.
A writer with a writer's block is tormented by his lack of inspiration. His girlfriend shows up and talks to him about his writing and her father. After she leaves, her father, an ex officer of the military and ex communist party member, rings the doorbell. After a tense introduction, the father starts to retell his life in order to try to explain why he did things that his daughter hates him for. It is not clear if writer's girlfriend and her father are part of writer's fiction, memories or reality.
The story of the battle of Iwo Jima between the United States and Imperial Japan during World War II, as told from the perspective of the Japanese who fought it.
The relationships of two couples become complicated and deceitful when the man from one couple meets the woman of the other.
After a colleague is murdered, insurance worker Kafka gets embroiled in an underground group who are attempting to thwart a secret organization that controls the major events in society.
Jarhead is a film about a US Marine Anthony Swofford’s experience in the Gulf War. After putting up with an arduous boot camp, Swofford and his unit are sent to the Persian Gulf where they are eager to fight, but are forced to stay back from the action. Swofford struggles with the possibility of his girlfriend cheating on him, and as his mental state deteriorates, his desire to kill increases.
At the height of the Vietnam war, Captain Benjamin Willard is sent on a dangerous mission that, officially, "does not exist, nor will it ever exist." His goal is to locate - and eliminate - a mysterious Green Beret Colonel named Walter Kurtz, who has been leading his personal army on illegal guerrilla missions into enemy territory.
When a group of idealistic young men join the German Army during the Great War, they are assigned to the Western Front, where their patriotism is destroyed by the harsh realities of combat.
New York in the 1920s. Max Perkins, a literary editor is the first to sign such subsequent literary greats as Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. When a sprawling, chaotic 1,000-page manuscript by an unknown writer falls into his hands, Perkins is convinced he has discovered a literary genius.
Hit man Cleve approaches writer/cop Dennis about a story for his next book: How Cleve made a living, working for one of the most powerful politicians in the country. To get the story right, they travel around the country to gather statements and evidence, while strong forces use any means they can to keep the story untold.
When young dockworker Jude leaves Liverpool to find his estranged father in the United States, he is swept up by the waves of change that are re-shaping the nation. Jude falls in love with Lucy, who joins the growing anti-war movement. As the body count in Vietnam rises, political tensions at home spiral out of control and the star-crossed lovers find themselves in a psychedelic world gone mad.
Paul, a young idealist trying to figure out what he wants to do with his life, takes a job interviewing people for a marketing research firm. He moves in with aspiring pop singer Madeleine. Paul, however, is disillusioned by the growing commercialism in society, while Madeleine just wants to be successful. The story is told in a series of 15 unrelated vignettes.
A commanding officer defends three scapegoats on trial for a failed offensive that occurred within the French Army in 1916.
The lives of Ted and Marion Cole are thrown into disarray when their two adolescent sons die in a car wreck. Marion withdraws from Ted and Ruth, the couple's daughter. Ted, a well-known writer, hires as his assistant a student named Eddie, who looks oddly similar to one of the Coles' dead sons. The couple separate, and Marion begins an affair with Eddie, while Ted has a dalliance with his neighbor Evelyn.