(FORTUNE Magazine) – The producer and director of last year's Academy Award-winning Vietnam epic, Platoon, can cite two painful lessons from their experience with that movie: Never stage a land war in Asia, and never accept ''points'' in Hollywood when you can get cash up front. Points in Hollywood-talk are percentage shares in a movie's profits, offered to attract essential personnel, usually the producer, director, and top stars. Platoon cost only $6 million to make and has collected over $140 million at the box office, so the uninitiated might imagine that a lot of money would already have been divided among point-holders. But producer Arnold Kopelson, with more points than a compass, complains he still hasn't seen ''one sou'' of the movie's profits. He is suing Hemdale Film Corp., which made Platoon, for the $25 million he says he's owed. Writer-director Oliver Stone similarly spent months checking his mailbox. Then Hemdale offered to buy out Stone's points, and he accepted. ''Stone was paid $5.1 million as the first part of an $8.5-million buyout,'' says Richard Hodge, Kopelson's attorney. ''But Arnold wouldn't sell out at that price. That's just a rip-off.'' Replies Hemdale chairman John Daly: ''He thinks he's entitled to far more money than we think he is.'' Squabbles over points usually arise one of two ways: Either a studio is slow to pay, or it refuses to pay at all, claiming that some monster hit somehow cannot quite climb into the black. As a veteran Hollywood bookkeeper observes, ''Most of the creative work in this business is done in the accounting department.'' Stars who easily could command points -- Robert Redford, for one -- now often pass them up in favor of a bigger salary. That way, at least, they know getting paid won't turn out to be as tough as getting the troops home before Christmas.