MovieChat Forums > Southern Comfort (1981) Discussion > The cross-on-the-chest joke

The cross-on-the-chest joke


I don't get it.

reply

There was no-joke to get. Boedin had gone crazy. Hardin, Spencer and the rest of the squad didn't 'get-it' either. Why did Boedin strip bare-chested and daub a cross on his chest in red paint? Was it to be reminscent of a Christian crusader 'exacting revenge' against a 'savage non believing enemy'? Boedin did say when asked that it was to represent 'the avenging angel'. Who knows, he was crazy!

reply

That may explain why crazy people are always bursting into fits of hysterical laughter; they must be laughing at some crazy person in-joke that you'd have to be Nutters-O-Butters in order to get.

I guess that's why mental intitutions are sometimes referred to as 'funny farms.'

reply

Makes you wonder......maybe they know something we don't.

For fans of this movie....I HIGHLY recommend "Dispatches" by Michael Herr.....it heavily inspired Apoc Now and FMJ.

There's a great line in it about someone going crazy; (roughly) "he followed the blacklight arrow around the bend to find the madness that had been waiting for him for (enter grunt's age) XX years.....



reply

Thanks for the recommendation.

reply

dalldorfw wrote:
"That may explain why crazy people are always bursting into fits of hysterical laughter; they must be laughing at some crazy person in-joke that you'd have to be Nutters-O-Butters in order to get."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

They're laughing at the absurdity of our human existences and wondering why nobody else does.

reply

So crazy people are like Bill Hicks.

reply

dalldorfw wrote:
"So crazy people are like Bill Hicks."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

The great Bill Hicks did have the advantage of articulating the absurdity more comprehensibly.

reply

Oh yeah, that's true. Bill Hicks managed to make others laugh with him.

reply

I didn't get it either. What was wrong with Cpl. Bowden?


reply

I think the little wheel was turning but the hamster died, if you get my drift.

reply