degsme:

...As a result any actual message or commentary on the "viscious heart of war" that this movie might have comes across instead as the over-earnest rantings of someone who has no clue about the real world.

I have a clue or two having served over ten years on active duty including a year in Iraq (2004) as a military intelligence Sergeant. I actually convoyed to Abu Ghraib prison once. Not to be excessively precious I am simply noting that Tarantino has done a good job of presenting some extremely repugnant aspects of human nature in ways which are demonstrative without being celebratory or so revolting to the viewer as to be inaccessible to a general audience, a difficult tight wire act done well.

I did not sense any 'cartoonish' portrayal of violence but the tenor of the film overall and the close-up scenes displaying killing in particular were reminiscent of the scene in 'Saving Private Ryan' where the Czech SS soldier kills the American sniper with a bayonet in an excruciatingly slow and sadistic manner which prior to this film marked the most credible display of depraved malevolence in war that I have seen in a film. But we shall disagree upon that point.