When Otis had all the prints he wanted, we went back upstairs to one of the projection rooms.

“You need any help?” I asked as he struggled to put a film on the projection reel with his left hand.

“No, it’s more fun this way… You know, when I was in the Nam there was this village called Ben Sue that was rumored to be sympathetic to the VC. But army intelligence was never able to prove it. So they finally ordered the destruction of the village. Bulldozers came in and leveled Ben Sue to the ground. There wasn’t even a trace that it ever existed. These flicks did to my mind what them bulldozers did to Ben Sue. The funny thing is, I can’t stop watching them. There’s something in me that still wants to believe that the Nam was like what we used to see in the movies… You remember A Walk in the Sun?”

“Yeah.”

“I run this scene over and over because a this dude, the one pointing up at the plane and saying ‘Look!’ See how he got it in the mouth? Right in the middle of a word. That’s the way it was in the Nam. The VC didn’t wait around for you to finish a sentence before they interrupted your train of thought with a mortar…

“Lemme run this clip of Sands of Iwo Jima… Remember this part where they makin the invasion of the island… Oh shit! Blew that Jap pillbox up… Check this part right here… Got damn… Uh-oh, there they go with the flag… Ira Hayes is the last one in the back… Look—he never even got his hand on it…”

“Otis!”

“This is where John Wayne gets it… Check the Jap playin possum! You gotta give it to the Duke, though. He played the good part. He gets it right after he lights up that cigarette. Blew that sucker away! See that bullet hole burnin in his back right below where it says ‘Sergeant Stryker.’ Watch John Agar empty a whole clip in that Jap… He definitely gave him a Japanese rupture—One Ball Hung Lo!”

“Otis!”

“This is the part I like, when John Agar raps. I know it by heart. ‘Aw right, you Marines, let’s saddle up and get back in the war.’ That reminds me of that scene in The Longest Day, about the Normandy invasion, when a whole company was pinned down on Omaha Beach and would not advance. Then Robert Mitchum comes up and says, ‘There’s only two kinds of men on this beach: those who are already dead and those who are about to die. So get up off your butts and move out!’”

“Otis, the film snapped!” I said, cutting on the lights. He cut off the projector, looked at the reams of film on the floor, and shot a defensive glance at me.

“What the fuck you lookin at?”

“What do you mean?”

“You think I’ve flipped out, don’t you?”