Zeus

The Anderson Platoon (1967)

• Director
  • Pierre Schoendoerffer
• Writer
  • Pierre Schoendoerffer
• Stars
  • Joseph B. Anderson
  • Stuart Whitman

  The French documentary The Anderson Platoon zeroes in on the seminal days of the American experience in Vietnam. Filmmaker Pierre Schoendoerffer goes along with a group of American GIs on five days' worth of reconnaissances and skirmishes. Without judging the war or its participants, the film records the lives, deaths, hopes and fears of its subjects. The film obviously had a strong influence on the much later American docudrama 84 Charlie Mopic. The Anderson Platoon won a "best documentary" Oscar in 1967.