Born on the Fourth of July

Born on the Fourth of July just reminds me of why I’m so lukewarm to Oliver Stone on a good day, and loathe him on a bad day. While the center of the film is a solid story, an impassioned howl about Vietnam and its numerous wrongs, it is trapped within too many stylistic diversions and distractions.

The early sequences are meant to be slices of Americana, but they’re too hokey, and filled with too many on-the-noise dialog passages to be entirely forgivable. The worst of which has Ron Kovic’s mother turning to him and creating a prophecy for his future by sharing a dream she had. It’s ham-fisted, indulging in the worst tricks of Stone as a storyteller – slow-motion, obvious symbolism pointed out, a grandiose tone that pounds away.

Once you accept that the film will be overblown, it becomes more enjoyable as Kovic ages, goes to war, and descends into self-hatred and activism. Certain scenes still ring with a sense of hysteria and bloat that don’t aid the epic tone he’s striving for, but he more often just rests his camera upon Tom Cruise and lets him act.

To be fair, I’ve never thought of Cruise as much of an actor. His lone mode of intensity or creeping manic laughter left me cold in numerous beloved properties. I only really warm up to him when he’s forced to dig deep in roles we wouldn’t normally picture him in, think of Magnolia or Interview with the Vampire. Here, he does commendable and strong movie star acting. Never quite disappearing entirely into the role, and frequently doing the type of acting that looks great in small chunks come award season or in career retrospectives, but he still digs deeper into the role than in anything he had done before.

Cruise is the main reason to watch Fourth of July, as most of the other actors are wasted in small supporting parts. Kyra Sedgwick, Raymond J. Barry, Willem Dafoe, Frank Whaley, these are just some of the actors given prominent billing in parts that are thinly written, drift in-and-out of the film randomly, or appear for a small handful of scenes then exit. None of them makes much of an impression since none of them are written as dynamic people. They’re supporting players to Kovic’s story, characters who exist to move the narrative forward, or to make sure emotional beats are hit properly.

Born on the Fourth of July was probably the first warning of the bloated, overindulgent tendencies that Oliver Stone would fall into as time went on, but it still has a visceral power in numerous ways. Cruise’s central performance is a solid anchor for the film, and it’s story is an important one, still timely and deeply felt. It’s good, but I don’t know if it’s just my distaste for Stone, or if between my first viewing of the film and my most recent one I noticed its flaws much more. Could be, the film hasn’t changed, but I certainly have.