A “masterpiece” war film that was released 40 years ago and won the Best Picture at Oscars is streaming on Netflix, leaving the audience in awe. Starring Robert De Niro, Meryl Streep and Christopher Nolan, The Deer Hunter follows the lives of Russian-American working-class families from Clairton, a steel mill town near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
The 1978 war drama movie has been streaming on Netflix since July 1 and it still has the power to captivate the love from the audience. The story follows three steelworkers whose lives are changed by the Vietnam War. It starts with a wedding, dives into the harsh realities of battle—including a tense Russian roulette scene—and ends with a somber funeral.
The film opens with Steven’s (played by John Savage) wedding, taking place just days before he’s deployed. Before they face the uncertainty ahead, Mike (Robert De Niro) organises one final deer hunting trip with their close-knit group of friends.
After the wedding, the story shifts to Vietnam, where the friends are captured by enemy forces and placed in a prison camp. There, they are forced into a tense and unforgettable Russian roulette scene. Meryl Streep earned an Oscar nomination for her role as Linda.
The film is widely praised as one of the greatest because of how powerfully it shows the effects of the Vietnam War on the soldiers’ lives. Several viewers have called it a “masterpiece” as they praised the movie for its perfect story and the direction.
One of the users wrote on Rotten Tomatoes: “A masterpiece. A film that truly portrays what friendship is all about. De Niro at his very best!”
Another user wrote: “A thoughtfully acted drama of immense depth, with excellent performances all around punctuated by DeNiro’s take on honor, relationships, and the horrors of war. Sincere, engrossing, and heart-rending.”
A third user chimed in: “Masterpiece! An epic that shows the effects of war on individual soldiers better than any other movie I’ve seen. An epic journey that needed all three hours to develop and depict.”
Not only among the viewers but the movie gained immense respect and love among the critics as well.
One of the critics commented: “Michael Cimino’s tale about the physical, emotional, and psychological impacts the Vietnam War had on a group of friends remains one of film’s ultimate masterpieces. Very few movies have ever captured the unsparing aftermath of war quite as devastatingly.”
Another one wrote: “The Deer Hunter is a film of great courage and overwhelming emotional power, a fiercely loving embrace of life in a death-ridden time. And it places the director-writer-producer, 37-year-old Michael Cimino, right at the center of our film culture.”