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against the movie may come partly from the increasing knowledge that the seemingly realistic
sequences of violence are not based on any reality.”
60
L. A. Weekly went even further, calling the
film “a criminal violation of the truth” in which all non-American are “sweaty, crazy, vicious
and debauched.”
61
Jon Pilger accused the movie of bending the truth to an unacceptable level:
America is debating itself again on the Vietnam War. One movie has triggered this debate: “The
Deer Hunter” […] For three years there was virtual silence. Then Hollywood sensed that a lot of
money could be made with a movie that appealed directly to those racist instincts that cause wars
and that allowed the Vietnam war to endure for so long—a movie that reincarnated the Batman-
jawed Caucasian warrior, that presented the Vietnamese as Oriental brutes and dolts […]
62
Pilger concluded his piece by accusing the “The Deer Hunter” of “insult[ing] the memory of
every American who died in Vietnam.”
63
Izvestia, the Soviet government newspaper also
denounced the movie, arguing that it was “an attempt at arousing compassion for the invaders “
and that it presented the events of the war “as if the aggressors and the victims changed
places.”
64
It also accused “Hollywood for the umpteenth time [to] extend a helping hand to the
Pentagon.”
65
But the row over the meaning of “The Dear Hunter” did not start at the Oscars. Already
a few months earlier, a number of delegations from socialist states had left the Berlin Festival in
protest about the movie being showed there.
66
Furthermore, the Soviet delegation had made it
clear that they found the showing of the film “inopportune” when a Sino-Vietnamese conflict
59
Aljean Harmetz, “Oscar-Winning ‘Deer Hunter’ Is Under Attack as ‘Racist’ Film” The New York Times
Apr. 26, 1979, p. C15
60
Quoted in ibid.
61
Quoted in ibid.
62
John Pilger, “The Gook-Hunter” The New York Times Apr. 26, 1979, p. A23
63
Ibid.
64
“Izvestia Assails Oscar For ‘The Deer Hunter’” The New York Time Apr. 12, 1979, p. A13
65
“A ‘Helping Hand’ to the Pentagon” The Washington Post Apr. 12, 1979, p. D21
Convention