tavm So after a year of enduring a "long wait" listing on Netflix, I finally got FTA in the mail yesterday and just watched it on DVD. A chronicle of Jane Fonda and Donald Sutherland's travails through the Pacific Rim with their fellow players for the title tour during 1971, we not only see them performing their skits and songs, we also see the disillusioned soldiers commenting on how they don't really understand or like the orders they're having to take during the then-current events of the Vietnam War. I was especially fascinated by the Philippines segment as both of my parents are from there and had left it long before that time. I liked many of the songs that were performed. The skits, not as much, but there were some amusing ones like Sutherland and a fellow player's play-by-play commentary of war as if they're at a football game! It seemed to drag near the end but still, I'm glad I watched FTA. Update: 10/5/14-There's a nice extra of Ms. Fonda talking about her experiences during the FTA tour. Well worth seeking on the disc.

moonspinner55 Insubordination set to music. Occasionally incisive but fatally overlong documentary follows Jane Fonda and Donald Sutherland as they lead a merry group of "subversive radicals" to areas outside of military bases in the Pacific Rim during December 1971; their mission is to perform an anti-military vaudeville show for disgruntled American GIs, complete with skits and songs. Their amusing, bitter-tinged satirical protests aside, there is a genuine understanding here for the plight of soldiers caught in the web of Vietnam, conflicted over what they're ultimately fighting for. The film has been edited with canny precision in order to be both entertaining and enlightening, though it makes its points in the first hour and then runs an extra thirty minutes. The issues raised are heated (particularly the racial factor, as blacks felt they were unfairly being targeted by the military as easy prey), though the preaching on-stage has been kept to a relative minimum in order to give the soldiers a fun evening. Many of the young men and women who attended these shows (and those who participated) took a definite risk by being branded as communist sympathizers or undemocratic malcontents, making "FTA" an edgy, often uneasy experience in hindsight. ** from ****

treesurgeon351 I didn't realize until quite recently that I was lucky to have seen this movie backintheday--it supposedly only appeared in theaters for a week or so. Caught up as I was in the anti-war movement of the day, I remember being impressed with the soldiers' reception of the show's songs and skits, and surprised by their own anti-Vietnam war sentiments.Don't recall many details from the show, but as a 21-year-old 'hip-eye wieeerdo' I can remember revelling in the 'thumb-in-the-establishment's-eye' spirit and energy of the performances.Mostly I remember that Donald Sutherland gave a harrowing, incredibly impressive dramatic performance of the final paragraphs from "Johhny Got His Gun."

anteye unfortunately, in other reviews made about this film there is a lack ofunderstanding. The time and place of this movie are the two things that are of utmost importance to comprehend, only with the comforting feeling of ignorance can the point of this material be avoided. Being the residual of a post-Vietnam society that resides in the same state on this day of November 1st, 2004 as it did when this film was made, can we still be so blinded by the pure'ed peas of pride. I would hope, all attention deficits and outside influences aside that you would be capable of seeing this film with an open mind.i applaud your effort. HL