An Officer and a Gentleman, 1982

An Officer and a Gentleman, 1982
Director: Taylor Hackford
Cast: Richard Gere, Debra Winger, David Keith





Stage. Home theatre


An Officer in short: Zack Mayo is a young man who has signed up for Navy Aviation Officer Candidate School. He is a Navy brat who has a bad attitude problem. GySgt Foley is there to train and evaluate him and will clearly find Zack wanting. Zack meets Paula, a girl who has little beyond family and must decide what it is he wants to do with his life.


Preps: wow, a long time no see classic, again in front of my eyes. This is why my mother adored Gere for such a long time. It was a definite win win for him and something to talk about in the eighties. No such movies today, unfortunately.


Reality: I am almost certain this movie served as a stage for two streams - one in Police Academy tone and the other in all Seagull marine movies. Name all the iterations you want, I am quite convinced that this piece started it all.

Yes, put in 80'ies. And combines all the pure things that we later on saw in many iterations. Mayo (Richard Gere) is sooooooo young in this piece you cannot believe your eyes. The wardrobe is like in those videos you can check out on VH1. Amazingly enough, the dialogues aren't really slick or fine tuned. The cast is not really brilliant. However, it's a classic you cannot afford to miss if you want to know the history of the movies. The hardcore training, the pain you see young officer is going through, the subtile meaning of a relationship and the way they couldn't afford to miss time at that point.

Making a relationship with an officer in that time was a code name for prostitution, as these things never were steady, never lasted and often ended in tears and forgotten kids those men left behind. Now you cannot imagine living in a world like this. However, there were benefits, because these young people weren't so burdened with everything that is happening around, like now young people need to think about. Like making your own way in a way that matters. And being surrounded by mass media, mass distribution of the news. In this movie, you see a niche, a hidden place from the rest of the world. Without internet, without your family, a friend around the globe being available on a click. Somewhere you go and get a training and focus on nothing else. Just this. And women, of course.

In present time nothing like this is possible. Unfortunately they don't hold academies on the islands miles away from civilization. The decisions, what to do with a perticular woman you like, are not that obvious as it seems in this piece. The decision to stay with someone is not based merely on liking, loving, but also on other factors, on which sometimes a person cannot make an influence or impact upon. Sometimes in present tense, everything is crashed by other factors. In the time, where this movie is filmed, all seemed to be pretty straightforward and obvious. The movie obviously also held ground for later huge success of Top Gun and many other wonderful pieces. But this one is the Father of them all in my perspective. And Gere made a tremendous impact on audience, and also grounds for his later popularity.

My personal rating: 8,0 (mmmmm, amazing piece. A must see for each filmophil)

An officer and gentleman on IMDB