Casualties of War
Casualties of War is a 1989 film about a soldier in the Vietnam war who finds himself the outsider of his own squad when they unnecessarily kidnap, rape, and murder a female villager.
Even in war... murder is murder. taglines
- Directed by Brian De Palma. Written by David Rabe, based on the novel by Daniel Lang.
Sgt. Tony Meserve
- Some mad fuckin' minute, huh cherry?
- Oh, you wanna take an attack posture wit' me? Yeah, you got a weapon. Clark got a weapon, Clark got a knife! We all got weapons! Anybody can blow anybody away, any second. Which is the way it ought to be. Always.
- Yea though I walk through the valley of evil, I will fear no death. Cuz I'm the meanest motherfucker in the valley.
- Brownie, look into my fuckin' eyes I'm gonna hypnotize you. YOU'RE FINE!
- This is a weapon, this is a gun. This is for fighting, this is for fun.
Others
- Eriksson: Everybody's acting like we can do anything and it don't matter what we do. Maybe we gotta' be extra careful because maybe it matters more than we even know.
- Lt. Reilly: So what was I doing in jail? What I was doing, let me advise you, was fixin' to shoot some mothafucka's working in that hospital, that's what I was doing.
- Cpl. Clark: Hey man, what happens in the field, stays in the field.
Dialogue
- Eriksson: Pardon me sir, what's your point, sir?
- Capt. Hill: There ain't no point, Eriksson. I'm simply trying to illuminate the terrain in which we currently find ourselves deployed. You don't mind that, do you? And if you do, FUCK YOU! You on my frequency?
- Eriksson: Yes SIR!
- Clark: The army don't wanna surprise us.
- Meserve: Leave it to the dinks for that, huh?
- Eriksson: Give me a minute on this thing we're doing. I mean, what we're doing. What are we doing, sarge?
- Meserve: We have a VC suspect. Is that what you mean? She's a VC whore and we're gonna have fun with her.
- Eriksson: She's just a farm girl.
- Meserve: You're the cherry here, right? So lighten up.
- Clark: Let me carry the weight. What's the problem, sarge?
- Meserve: He don't think our VC whore is a VC whore.
- Rowan: [Eriksson is explaining the killing of the Vietnamese girl to Rowan, unaware that Clarke is behind him] Uh, was Clarke in on all this?
- Eriksson: Oh, yeah, man. He's fucking nuts-
- Rowan: [interrupting] He's right here.
- Meserve: You're taking your turn in there.
- Eriksson: No! I ain't raping nobody!
- Meserve: You think you're sayin' no to ME? You're taking your turn.
- Eriksson: No.
- Meserve: Well maybe when I'm through with her, I'm gonna come after you. Maybe when I'm done humping her, I'm gonna come hump you!
- Meserve: I hate the army. I bet you like the army, don't you Eriksson?
- Eriksson: This ain't the army, sarge.
- Clark: [after the rapes] When's the last time you had a real woman, Sarge?
- Meserve: She was real.
- Eriksson: Who got hit Sarge?
- Hawthorne: The cherry. Man, that boy was bagged and tagged the minute they cut his orders to this place. They should've just shot him at home.
- Eriksson: You sick son of a bitch!
- Clark: I told you, cherry. What happen...
- [Clark is hit in the face by Eriksson with a shovel]
- Eriksson: Nobody cares, Meserve. I told everybody. I told them. You don't have to worry. You don't have to try to kill me, man. I told them, and THEY DON'T CARE!
- Capt. Hill: You couldn't let it rest, could you? You had to push it?
- Eriksson: Go to hell. SIR.
- Girl on Bus: You had a bad dream, didn't you?
- Eriksson: Yes.
- Girl on Bus: It's over now, I think. Chao ong.
Cast
- Michael J. Fox - PFC Eriksson
- Sean Penn - Sgt. Tony Meserve
- Don Harvey - Cpl. Thomas E. Clark
- John C. Reilly - PFC. Herbert Hatcher
- Thuy Thu Le - Tran Thi Oanh/Girl on Bus
- John Leguizamo - PFC. Antonio Diaz
- Jack Gwaltney - PFC. Rowan
- Erik King - Cpl. Brown
- Ving Rhames - Lt. Reilly
- Dan Martin - Hawthorne
- Dale Dye - Capt. Hill