#1511 - Oliver Stone

Joe Rogan (0:03)

All right, here we go.

Thank you very much for being here. I'm a really big fan, so this is an honor for me. I'm really, really excited. I'm really excited about your book. I'm really excited about just your films, The Untold History in the United States, which I think is fantastic.

I mean, that's one of my favorite things that you've ever done, and so thorough and so interesting. But the book, first of all, look how good you look on the cover there.

Oliver Stone (0:26)

What an old shot.

Joe Rogan (0:27)

Done handsome bastard, look at you. Lookin good there.

What year is that from?

Oliver Stone (0:32)

It was 1968, November. I'd just come off the last mission in Vietnam.

It was on a hilltop. We got stuck in the rain in the Aishow Valley. It was the first cavalry. And we really, the helicopters couldn't get in for 11 days. It was awful.

Joe Rogan (0:48)

Wow.

Oliver Stone (0:48)

We had leeches everywhere. And the enemy, we didn't know where they were, but we felt that they were gonna close in. But it was too wet, ultimately, for them to close in. But they knew we were there. So we were praying. The whole time was kind of nerve-racking. Because it was my last few days, you understand. I was supposed to get out of there.

When Diros left the country, I was due out. I had volunteered for an extra three months in order to get out of the army three months sooner. In other words, they had, normally you had to serve, if a two-year deal, you had to serve six months stateside on the backside of it.

So, I didn't want to do that because I was going nuts with the rules and the regulations, and I'd gotten into some trouble with that. So I extended in combat for another three months, and that ended up in this mission.

Joe Rogan (1:37)

How much did your time serving impact your directing?

You've had these life experiences as someone who's just a filmmaker, they really can't draw upon. You've had actual combat experience, and when you're making movies about combat, I mean, that has to be a gigantic advantage, or at least it adds layers to it that are almost impossible to recreate for someone who's just trying to imagine what it's like.

Oliver Stone (2:05)

Yeah, and that was very important when we did Platoon. I was trying to get the exact distances and the amount of firepower is not as intense, generally speaking, as the movies make it.

Joe Rogan (2:20)

Yeah.

Oliver Stone (2:20)

And that's the problem because the movies have so much to show, they bring the enemy much closer, they condense things, and they amplify as much as possible. Now, I did that too here and there, so I'm guilty too, but I think overall it's way overdone, and the newer stuff that's come out since 2001, with the patriotic stuff and heavily militaristic stuff, it's way off, way off.

And people don't die that way, like in the type of films like Mark Wahlberg made, or those kind of films, they're just way, way overdone. Anyway.

Joe Rogan (3:00)

In what way?

Oliver Stone (3:02)

Well, what was the name of the film? Lone Survivor?

Joe Rogan (3:04)

Yeah.

Oliver Stone (3:05)

Was that the name of it? Yeah, they get dropped off, whatever, in 10 guys, and they manage to kill how many Taliban for each guy.

Joe Rogan (3:11)

How much of that was based on, I mean, it's all about Marcus Luttrell's life. I haven't had a chance to talk to Marcus, I'm friends with him, but I don't know how much of it, they monkey with everything.

Whenever they make a moving.

Oliver Stone (3:25)

It was way overdone, it was way overdone. What I've heard and what's been reported is that they got trapped right away. It was pretty quick, the ambush went on, and they got the shit kicked out of themself.

And I can't be, I don't remember exactly the details, but he did get away, and some people did scam, but it doesn't look like it does in the movie, where everyone's a hero.

Joe Rogan (3:49)

That is a problem, and that's one of the things that I really loved about Platoon. Everyone wasn't a hero.

I mean, the Tom Baringer character.

Oliver Stone (3:57)

Yeah, he existed, it's in the book. It's based on a guy called Sergeant, well, I called him Sergeant Barnes, but he had a, I wouldn't use his real name, real guy. Getting shot in the face, and was scarred, distorted, kind of handsome like that. But he was a serious guy, and he knew what he was doing. He was the leader of the platoon. See, I made clear that the leaders of the platoon were not really the lieutenants, they were the platoon sergeant and the squad sergeants.