Same here. I figured he was mid-70s or so.

https://developer.valvesoftware.com/w/images/7/7c/Vortigaunt.jpg

He voiced the Vortigaunts in Half Life 2

Off to the Great Shizzma

Question.   How accurate was Lou’s character in Officer and a Gentleman?   Feels like a million years since I saw that movie as a kid.  

I feel like the gist of Lou’s character was an enlisted man that was training future Navy pilots and officers.   How does this work in the real world?   Obviously he isn’t teaching them aerodynamics or how to fly.  Is his job just to PT them until their assholes are sucking buttermilk like Sergeant Hartman?  Inquiring minds want to know how this works.

my favorite character he played :  very well done -- great movie IMO

From IMDB:  "(February 8, 2010) Diagnosed with prostate cancer."

He lasted quite a while with it or kicked it.  

He absolutely nailed that role.

This was one I watched a lot growing up he costarred in. RIP chief.

Rest In Peace

Short answer, yes.

Here’s a small blurb of history, etc.

https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2009/november/nobody-asked-me-butkeep-marine-dis-ocs

RIP LGJ



( Would you look at that crease in his sleeve?  Holy shit!  That’s stract!)

watching An Officer and a Gentleman now

This.

WARNING:  major thread drift in progress….

When you look at any “old school” boot camp, basic cadet training scenario, or officer  candidate school, the goal is to tear people down and rebuild them back up in the image that particular Institution wants.

Way back when, 30 plus years ago, I looked into Air Force Combat Control Team as an officer.  Their introductory school for both O’s and E’s was at Lackland AFB, TX .  If I recall correctly, that was the start of a 2 year long training “pipeline”.  Their literature at the time was really blunt about that initial phase at Lackland.  It is there where you will be indoctrinated.  Or you will get washed out.

“Indoctrinated” is a polite way of saying “brainwashed”. (Hell, I think they even called it “The Indoctrination Phase”.)

Think about what just about any “boot camp” does.  Or at least used to do.

They strip you of your identity.

They take away your civilian clothes.

They cut off all your hair (if you’re male).

They tell you to wear the same clothes as everyone else.

They tell you when to sleep.

They tell you when to wake up.

You are sleep deprived on purpose.

They tell you when to eat.

They intentionally give you X calories per day when you’re actually expending way more than that.

They tell you when to shower.

When to piss and shit.

They physically fatigue you to exhaustion.

If that isn’t “brainwashing” then I don’t know what is.  1960’s Charlie Manson could NOT create a better or more efficient system.

And yes, part of that is having somebody who steps in as a hard ass’ed “surrogate parent”.  Which is one reason the military likes fresh faced kids right out of high school.  Part of that is they are more “malleable” or “docile”.  And they haven’t been out in the real world long enough to figure things out on their own.

Part of being a D.I. is to provide stress to those basics.  In the long term, it is “stress inoculation”.  

Let’s say I am an instructor pilot, and my student is sitting next to me as I put the plane into a spin, I shake the stick, and go “YOUR PLANE!” and cross my arms in front of me.  I’m gonna need my student to start running through the P.A.R.E. checklist.  He or she can’t be so overwhelmed by stress that his or her brain goes into vapor lock mode.  Of course, there should have been several what they call “stand ups” where somebody is picked at random from a classroom setting and the lead IP goes, “On your takeoff roll, you smell smoke in the cockpit.  What do you do?”   There is nothing quite like standing up in the middle of your classmates with the potential for embarrassing yourself in front of your peers  to both motivate you to perform better, and to provide some stress.  

If somebody goes “vapor lock” during stand up during some classroom on the ground, how do you think they are going to do in the cockpit at say 20,000 feet?

EDIT:  I just got a text back from my hunting buddy in KC.  He went through Marine Corps OCS at Quantico in 1975.  He said dropping your rifle = getting punched by the DI.  He went on to fly Cobras and A-4 Skyhawks.  He said R. Lee Ermey’s portrayal in FMJ was more like what he experienced versus LGJ in An Officer and a Gentleman.  

Source of the GD Creed:

    Foley : You can forget it! You're out!

    Mayo : Don't you do it! Don't! You... I got nowhere else to go! I got nowhere else to g... I got nothin' else.

RIP LGJ

His son went to Syracuse University. We had a fraternity conference at a local hotel where he was staying. He came down one night and drank with us, very cool dude.

I always liked him as an actor.

Jane Pauley looks back at the career of Louis Gossett, Jr., whose acclaimed performances included the TV series "Roots," and the film "An Officer and the Gentleman," for which he became the first African American actor to win a best supporting actor Oscar.

MY GRAMMAMA WANTS TO FLY JETS!!!

I love that scene.