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Gardens of Stone Customer Reviews (1 - 3 of 13 Reviews)

Spot On...
The story line was a bit of surprise for Hollywood. A "war" movie w/out blood or combat. Doing a movie about the Old Guard and Arlington during the Vietnam War was pretty brave considering the sympathy displayed for the men involved...You have a PSG (platoon dad)James Caan, torn by demands of duty and a family lost to him because of that duty. (This should reasonate with all of us vets who lost our families because of our duty) He has a job he hates and one he knows he is good at but still wants a return to his line job of leading infantrymen. You have the CSM (sargeant major) James Earl Jones, the young gung ho troop DB Sweeny (they are alot more numerous then common perception would have), Dean Stockwell as the CO(company commander) Anjelica Huston as Caan's anti war love interest and a fine supporting cast.

I was really impressed with the overall story line. I disagree with many of the other reviewers as this is not an anti war movie. Coppola did his research and the movie really does a great job of showing what life is often like in the Army. He showed the little details (M14 rifles and the detail in the barracks TA50 inspection) that Hollywood so seldom gets despite the military advisors they hire to check out scripts. The day to day workings of the Machine in garrison brought back alot of memories too. The Army was really like this People, it is/was a very tight organization and the Old Guard is a good example of that tightness.

I have worked w/those guys and seen them at their job. Despite all the pressures, they seldom (almost never in the public eye) fall down. The stuff that goes on behind the public eye is what makes the story so compelling. I'm not a Coppola fan but he did this right and surprisingly w/respect too.

An Affectionate Tribute to the Old Guard
I hail from the Washington DC area and lived in Arlington for many years. As an Army brat, I spent many hours on post at Ft. Myer and observed many of the ceremonies captured in the film. Finally my father was buried with full military honors in Arlington Cemetery during the period covered by the film. Despite the fact that the story is very unremarkable, if not labored, even with such a high-powered cast, it is filled with long loving silent meditations on the ceremonies, and for that, it deserves respect. The credits pay eloquent and simple tribute to all the services' ceremonial units, but this is the Old Guard's show, and they execute with the poise and precision for which the unit is world famous. I found it very moving.

Basically a glorified clunker
I first saw this movie when it came out in 1987, at a time when the success of "Platoon" had inspired a new wave of Vietnam movies. Whenever you hear the name Francis Ford Coppola, you think something good has to be coming. To be sure, none of his movies are "bad" movies, but not all measure up to the high caliber of his early films like "The Conversation" and Godfathers I & II. This movie has some wonderful actors: James Caan (a longtime Coppola favorite), James Earl Jones, and Angelica Huston. But I think you're faced with the oldtime dilemma here of a better cast than movie. Caan and Jones are the grizzled veterans assigned to Arlington Cemetery, and D.B. Sweeney is the young soldier who becomes their protege. Sweeney is discontented with Arlington and wants to go to Vietnam so he can emulate his two heroes who fought in World War II and Korea. Sweeney appeared to be an up and coming star at this time, and you see a couple of other promising faces that never quite achieved stardom: Mary Stuart Masterson and Casey Siemaszko, to name a few. To put it plainly, while this film has some good moments, basically it's a glorified clunker.

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