Full Metal Jacket

De humanisation

In the beginning of the film, the soldiers are having their heads shaved. This is done to take away any

In the scene involving the attack from the vietnam soldiers on the American base, the soldiers enter the base but as an audience we do not see their face as they look like black shadows or silhouettes due to the low key lighting, which de humanises them as they are literally faceless. They are however the clear enemy and are only involved in the scene to be killed.

In the scene involving the sniper it is unclear what they look like as we only see them through a POV shot at the beginning, this de humanises the sniper as we do not see their face or have any who they are or what they look like, therefore they become a faceless enemy. However it is clear the sniper is well trained as they manage to draw the other marines out my first injuring one solider, during the duration of this scene three marines are eventually killed.

This scene is one of very few that involves non-diegetic sound, the sound is loud slow paced drums, this builds up to the climax when Joker sees the sniper for the first time. When the solider turns around it is revealed that they are a teenage girl.

After the girl is shot she begins to pray as she slowly dies, one of the characters then refers to her as "dead meat", which furthermore dehumanises her as she is no longer human but instead a dying piece of meat on the floor.