Once upon a screen: explosive paradox
Decades after seeing ‘Platoon’, Kevin recalls how the film stirred generational trauma in his family and racism at school - by Aeon Video Watch on Aeon
In this video essay, US filmmaker Kevin B Lee recounts his childhood experience of watching the Vietnam War film Platoon in a San Francisco cinema. He recalls the shock and harrowing experience he and his family faced at the theater, where the raw and violent portrayal of the war left a lasting impact on him beyond the theater's walls.
The film also stirred generational trauma within his family and even led to racism at school. Lee's approach to the topic is deceptively simple, yet he manages to invert and subvert Oliver Stone's epic movie, creating a profound and intensely personal meditation on memory. His video essay was published as part of a series called 'Once Upon a Screen', which explores film viewing and childhood trauma.
The series, commissioned and curated by Ariel Avissar and Evelyn Kreutzer, was published in The Cine-Files journal of cinema studies, Issue 15. The essay takes a poignant turn when Lee mentions a haunting scene from Minority Report that inspired his exploration of time and memory.
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