SOLDIER ON THE SILVER SCREEN

IDWAY THROUGH (1986), Oliver Stone’s classic film about the Vietnam War, a brash private reassures a squad mate assigned to share his foxhole, “Don’t you worry, Junior. You’re hanging with Audie Murphy here, my man!” He doesn’t have to explain the name—or the reputation—he’s evoking. The squad mate knows. The audience knows. Audie Murphy was well-known as the most highly decorated American soldier of World War II—indeed, in the entire military history of the United States., the 1955 film based on Murphy’s 1949 memoir. was autobiographical in a different sense as well, for in it Murphy played himself.