Australia committed 61,000 troops to the Vietnam War, yet few films show their story. Tom Jeffrey's flawed but enjoyable The Odd Angry Shot (1979) presents the conflict through the eyes of a special forces unit, suffering more from day-to-day discomfort than enemy bullets. Bill (John Jarrett) is conscripted into the Australian military during Vietnam. He winds up in the Special Air Service Regiments, a special forces group pulling tough patrols in the Vietnamese countryside. The Aussie skirmish with Vietcong and dodge booby traps, but mostly battle disease, climate, and simple boredom. Veteran soldier Harry (Graham Kennedy) amiably helps the men retain sanity in an increasingly pointless conflict.
Based on William Nagle's novel, The Odd Angry Shot focuses on everyday military life, the festering boredom of young men far from home. Jeffrey makes the most of these quiet patches, developing characters alongside mood and atmosphere. Between patrols, Bill and his maters stave off boredom with booze, card games and insect fights. A Saigon brothel offers only temporary respite. News from home only generates disappointment or worse. Even their patrols are more monotonous than deadly. Death comes from unexpected corners, namely mortar attacks and mines.
Like most Aussie war films, Shot celebrates comradeship over politics or individual heroism. Our heroes bond over shared experiences, establishing a common front against aloof officers and pompous noncoms. They get along with Americans, even if one meeting ends with a dust-up. In this context, the complaints about unappreciative civilians seem less authorial grandstanding than honest characterization. When one soldier questions why they're fighting, Harry offers a paraphrase of Nigel Green's comment in Zulu.
Admittedly, Shot suffers somewhat from a limited budget. The Queensland locations provide a poor substitute for Vietnam (admittedly, no worse than the Hue scenes in Full Metal Jacket) while the action scenes are held to modest firefights. Yet this plays into Jeffrey's modest ambitions: he's not interested in pyrotechnics and spectacle anyway. The authenticity of military hardware shows a degree of government cooperation beyond any Hollywood movies.
John Jarrett became a fixture of Aussie cinema, from Picnic at Hanging Rock to his villain turn in Wolf Creek. He's likeably callow but barely develops beyond this initial characterization. Graham Kennedy gets the better part, a tough, chummy veteran concealing a damaged center. Squad mates include Bryan Brown, John Hargreaves and Graeme Bundell.
The Odd Angry Shot is no masterpiece. It's slow-paced, episodic and occasionally sags; its modest scale might disappoint war movie buffs. But this isn't a giant battle epic, rather a tribute to soldiers in a forgotten war.
