... are many, no matter what their political persuasion, who say "we lost the war," a consensus recognition of frustrated national desire. The films about US intervention in Vietnam are structured around this confrontation between "desire" and "history." The difficulty, however, is that, as James William Gibson notes, "Unlike previous American experiences of war, there was no popular cultural archetype to ... a "democratic- national identity - one that fights for the underdog and respects cultural and racial differences. The perspective on the war provided by nave minds leaves very little ro...

• Word Count: 2039
• Approx Pages: 8
• Grade Level: Undergraduate