Stanley Kubrick's first film for seven years details the dehumanizing effect of military combat, as experienced by a bunch of Vietnam conscripts under the training of the sadistic Gunnery Sergeant Hartman (R. Lee Ermey). The second half of the film follows one of the recruits, Joker (Matthew Modine), onto the battlefield as he is thrown into the war at the height of the Tet offensive. The entire movie was shot on location in East London.