The United States’s involvement in the Vietnam War began in 1955 and ended twenty years later in 1975. It was a proxy war between the anti-communist forces (US) and communist forces (USSR and China). Millions of Vietnamese were killed, and the US military engagement cost the lives of 58,281 American soldiers. At its peak, in April 1969, the US had 543,000 soldiers in Vietnam.

As the war intensified in the mid-1960s, the anti-war movement in the United States became one of the most pervasive displays of opposition to government policy in modern times. Initially, demonstrations were organized by peace activists and leftist intellectuals on college campuses. Soon, protests emerged nationwide in San Francisco, New York, Oakland, and Berkeley. When the US began bombing North Vietnam in 1965, some critics began to question the government’s assertion that it was fighting a democratic war to liberate the South Vietnamese people from communist aggression.

Soon, the peace movement swelled to include hippies, primarily young people who rejected authority and increasingly embraced the counterculture. In addition, some members of the entertainment industry, most notably Jane Fonda, became peace activists. During the early 1960s, Jane supported the civil rights movement and met French intellectuals who opposed the war while married to the French director Roger Vadim.

In 1970, Fonda spoke at a rally organized by Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. She offered to raise money for the organization, and the group rewarded her with the title of Honorary National Coordinator. That fall, she embarked on a tour of college campuses. Concurrently, Fonda formed a film production company named Indochina Peace Campaign (IPC). She wanted to make a film about an injured vet to raise awareness about the war. She was inspired by Ron Kovic, a paraplegic Vietnam War veteran she met through her work with VVAW.

In 1972, Fonda hired Nancy Dowd, a friend from her days in the feminist movement, to write a script about the consequences of the war as seen through the eyes of a conservative military wife. The project languished for several years until the final team of Fonda, director Hal Ashby, cinematographer Haskell Wexler, producer Jerome Hellman, and new screenwriters Waldo Salt and Robert C. Jones took it on. All were united in their opposition to the Vietnam War and were concerned about the veterans who were returning and finding it hard to adapt to life back home.

The movie featured Fonda as Sally Hyde, a loyal and conservative military wife, married to Bob Hyde, a USMC captain about to be deployed to Vietnam. At first, Sally dreads being left alone, but after being forced to find housing off the base, she feels liberated. With time on her hands, she starts volunteering at a local veterans’ hospital. There, she meets Vi Munson, played by Penelope Milford. Sally, inspired by the bohemian Munson, whose brother, Billy, has come home from Vietnam with grave problems, meets Luke, a former high school classmate, played by Jon Voight, another Vietnam returnee who is a paraplegic.

Opening scenes filmed at a vet hospital were improvised, with injured vets expressing their views on the Vietnam War. The 1960s soundtrack, featuring music from The Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Big Brother and the Holding Company, and Tim Buckley, underscored the story’s immediacy. This sensitive film was released in 1978, and with the conflict still fresh in people’s minds, it began to help people come to terms with the war.

The indie film grossed $32.7 million on a budget of $3 million. It garnered eight Academy Award nominations. Jane Fonda received a nod for Best Actress, and Penelope Milford was nominated for Best Supporting Actress. Other nominations included one for Jon Voight, Best Actor. Ultimately, the picture received three awards, with Fonda and Voigt receiving Oscars and the film receiving an award for Best Picture.

Today, after a long and rewarding career as an actor on stage and on the screen, Penelope Milford resides in Kingston and is the musical director for the Christian Science Church in Woodstock.

~Weston Blelock

Coming Home trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0hB7ZyK6yU

HD Film Tribute: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVAEsNaQr-Q