Full Metal Jacket is the title of a 1987 movie of the war film genre, directed by Stanley Kubrick, and based on the novel The Short Timers by Gustav Hasford. For the ammunition after which the film is named, see Full metal jacket .

The first part of the film follows the basic training of a group of Marine recruits during the Vietnam War era under the brutal command of drill instructor Gunnery Sergeant Hartman (played by R. Lee Ermey, whose performance earned him a Golden Globe nomination for best supporting actor ). The drill is depicted as designed to wash away the recruits' personalities and turn them into killers, but the brutal treatment of Leonard 'Gomer Pyle' Lawrence, played by Vincent D'Onofrio results in his murder of the drill instructor. He then kills himself. He uses a rifle loaded with full metal jacket ammunition, suggesting an interpretation for the film's title.

The second part then takes place in Vietnam, mostly focusing on Marine recruit J.T. 'Joker' Davis (Matthew Modine) now a Sergeant and a Stars and Stripes war correspondent, as he covers the Tet Offensive. The 'Joker' soon becomes familiar with both the horror and the absurdity of war. His helmet decorations – the slogan "Born to Kill" and the Peace symbol – exemplify his moral ambiguity. The film concludes with the soldiers' ironic rendition of the theme song to the Mickey Mouse Club. And some of the songs in this movie are "Hello vietnam" ,"Patriotic Full Metal Jacket Military Cadence" .

Full Metal Jacket has been widely praised for accurately evoking the mood of the Vietnam War from the soldier's point of view. Recurring themes are the contradictions of war, a constant feeling of being out of one's depth, and the idea of combat in Vietnam being part of a different world, with its own rules and customs. The miasma of confusion and angst of the new world begins in boot camp, and spirals down into bloodshed before even landing in Vietnam.

In the aftermath of this film a series of policy changes came about in what was considered acceptable behavior by a drill instructor in the United States Armed Forces. All references to a recruit's family are absolutely forbidden, as is striking a recruit.

The movie was shot mainly on the Isle of Dogs, a peninsula in east London. Palm trees were imported from Spain. The ravaged city scenes were shot in a disused gas works. While this was reasonable for the urban nature of the Tet offensive, it can be attributed to Kubrick's aversion to travel, especially by plane: after receiving death threats during the filming of Barry Lyndon in Ireland, he had decided never again to leave Great Britain.