An Officer and a Gentleman (1982)

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Blistering performances.

I've never served in the armed forces, so I can't vouch for the accuracy of the events depicted in "An Officer and a Gentleman". What I can say is that it's an intense movie but the ending has to be one of the corniest endings ever scripted and filmed. Otherwise it's a good movie, as Richard Gere's new recruit enlists in the US navy and experiences a grueling regimen at the hands of gunnery sergeant Louis Gossett Jr. (Fiddler on "Roots"). The whole part about the local women wanting to hook up with the navy men doesn't stick in my mind as much, but if you're looking for great shots of the Olympic Peninsula, this is the movie for you.The rest of the cast includes Debra Winger, David Keith (the dad in "Firestarter"), Tony Plana (the dad on "Ugly Betty") and Robert Loggia.

Greetings from Lithuania."An Officer and a Gentleman" (1982) is simply a great movie. It shows a very realistic and down to earth romance, while at the same time centers on a men (and one woman) attempt to become air pilots and to "survive" their gunnery Sgt.Performances are superb by all involved. Louis Gossett Jr. won Oscar for best supporting role - this is a very good performance - he shows that at the same time he is very strict officer but at the same time only by his face sometime shows that he is also a human - this is not an evolving character, but a very three dimensional in a very strict role. Others were also above very good, they are great. Overall, this movie is not a "cheezee" romance, it is a very accurate portrait of romance, which shows that both have to work to build up a relationship. Directing, script and editing are also top notch - at running time 2 h this movie never (!) drags and is very involving from start till finish. All in all this is a great movie.

Released in 1982, "An Officer and a Gentleman" was the obvious inspiration of films like Tom Cruise's "Top Gun" and "Days of Thunder." "An Officer and a Gentleman" was the first and best, by far.The plot similarities are obvious: They all include the angry young man who needs to prove his gifting, the uncompromising mentor, the encouraging babe, the craft, the arena and the doomed buddy. In "An Officer" the angry young man is Richard Gere as Mayo, the mentor is Louis Gossett Jr. as Drill Instructor Folely, the babe is Paula (Debra Winger), the craft is aviation basic training, the arena is a Naval academy and the Puget Sound area of Washington (shot on location) and the buddy is Sid Worley (David Keith).Thankfully, the film doesn't get bogged down telling the back-story of Mayo. Instead, it ingeniously shares his past in a matter of minutes at the very beginning. It's all we need to know to understand why Mayo is the way he is. And then we're off to basic training where he's tested. Does he have what it takes? Can someone as lowborn, aloof and un-trusting as Mayo make it as an officer?Debra Winger and Lisa Blount shine here as Mayo and Worley's babes. Winger is alluring in a humble "girl next door" type of way (she out-shined Lynda Carter as Wonder Girl on "Wonder Woman," which is hard to believe), but Blount is even more alluring -- yes, despite the negative aspects of her character. I'll just put it this way, she really fills out a pair of jeans, lol. Both couples get intimate way too quickly, but maybe this is one of the flaws of the "Puget Debs" and explains why they have a problems getting marriage material, if you know what I mean. Besides this, time has to be condensed in a two-hour film.BOTTOM LINE: If you're in the mood for a film of this ilk "An Officer and a Gentleman" is the best of the lot.GRADE: AINSIGHTS ABOUT THE ENDING (***SPOILER ALERT*** Don't read further unless you've seen the film):An officer is a military leader. Drill Instructor Foley's job is to weed out those who can't hack it as an officer. It's an important job because people's lives in combat are dependent on the quality of the leaders and Foley takes his job seriously.Foley rightly pegs Mayo as a lowlife loner from the outset -- a wannabe officer -- and therefore puts on the pressure. This is especially so on the one weekend where he has Mayo to himself. Foley does everything he can to make Mayo break AND quit, but Mayo doesn't. He breaks, indeed, but he refuses to quit on the grounds that he has no where to go. At the end of this scene you can see that Foley develops respect for Mayo (which you get a glimpse of earlier when Mayo does extremely well on the obstacle course).Later, Mayo disregards breaking the record on the obstacle course (which he was definitely able to do) in order to encourage Seegar (the female recruit) to finally make it over the wall. Foley sees that Mayo's no longer the aloof and selfish loner he was when he rode in on his motorcycle. He's matured; he's developed character. It was already there, of course, but the boot camp training has brought it to the fore, and Foley sees it.After Worley's tragic death, Mayo confronts Foley while he's drilling the platoon. Foley informs Mayo that they all know what happened and even tells him they're sorry about Worley. He didn't have to do this and it shows that Foley isn't just an honorable man, but also that he cared about Worley. After all, Worley was only one week away from graduating! In a sense, he was one of Foley's kids. In other words, Foley and the platoon were grieving too. But Mayo was closest to Worley and he's crazy with shock & grief at this point. He insists that he's going to quit, to which Foley tells him to meet him for a fight. Sure, there's some testosterone in his words, but he actually does this out of respect for Mayo as a last ditch effort to keep him from dropping out.And Foley doesn't "kick his axx", as some claim. It was essentially an even match and Foley barely walks off the mat, which is the only reason he technically wins. But that's inconsequential. The purpose of the fight was to run Mayo's steam out so he didn't make a rash decision in an obvious moment of grief & anger. Foley accomplished his purpose. Once Mayo was no longer blinded by rage he makes the right choice and graduates.This is why he thanks Foley at the end.

Richard Gere plays Zack Mayo, a prospective Navy Officer training cadet who must decide to gain control over his direction-less life, helped by a no-nonsense Gunnery sergeant(superbly played by Louis Gossett Jr., who won an Academy Award) who berates Zack, but all in the effort of making him into a successful Naval officer. Debra Winger plays his girlfriend, who is also struggling with her own life. They both have friends(played by David Keith and Lisa Blount) whose relationship mirrors their own, only with far different results.Entertaining and old-fashioned(in some ways!) film is well acted by its stars, and has stylish direction by Taylor Hackford. Story is surprisingly involving(if a bit predictable) and builds to a satisfying conclusion with the winning song "Up Where We Belong".A big hit that made its leads stars.