ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that the most compelling Vietnam-era films ultimately shared many basic premises with the earlier tradition of one-dimensional combat pictures, reproducing several old discourses in new guise. In their myriad ways the post-Vietnam era films reflect the decline of American politics and popular culture, perhaps even the crisis of empire itself. The Vietnam syndrome clearly persists in Hollywood as in Washington, insofar as none of the cinematic works presents any true account of the war and its massive consequences for both Vietnamese and Americans. Hollywood cinema dramatized everything from a uniquely provincial standpoint, one that is ethnocentric, inner-focused, and draped in the imagery of US tragedy, victimism, and lost innocence. Although The Fog of War is never clear on the issue, those who engineered the Vietnam War would by any objective criteria have to be considered bona fide war criminals.
