Apocalypse Now

The in Vietnam during the 60's and early 70's was a very turbulent time in American history.  We went there to eliminate Communism and liberate South Vietnam from the Communist North Vietnam.  It became clear early on, that this would no ordinary battle against the North Vietnamese army, also known as the Vietcong.  Why?  The Vietcong dressed and looked like civilians, so we had no way of telling one from the other.  Throughout the war, there have been numerous....incidents involving the murder of civilian Vietnamese.  Our people were outgunned and out-manned in a country where the Vietcong had the advantage.  Approximately, over 3.8 million people on all sides lost their lives by the time we had withdrawn.  There have been numerous films over the decades about the war in Vietnam, but one truly stands out among the rest: Apocalypse Now.

As the movie begins we see a strung-out soldier, Captain Benjamin Willard(Martin Sheen)being given orders to travel to Cambodia and terminate the rogue Special Forces Colonel Walter Kurtz(Marlon Brando).  Along the way, he meets up with Colonel Kilgore(Robert DuVall)so he can get upriver.  On the surface, the story seems like pretty one-dimensional about one man's mission, but as the film goes on, it starts descending into chaos, as Willard travels to Cambodia to confront Kurtz.  Apocalypse Now is an extraordinary look at how war affects soldiers on a psychological level.  While some soldiers are of sound mind, others start losing their sanity, and this is extremely evident when we finally meet Kurtz.  We also see Willard start unraveling as the film progresses.  While we see the first half of the film as basically a war film, with explosions and helicopters wreaking havoc on the Vietnamese, the second half becomes more psychological as the soldiers accompanying Willard start seeing some very strange things and it starts freaking them out.  The final part of the movie is just plain nuts.

Shamefully, I never actually saw this movie before today, and I'm not entirely sure why.  It's an experience like no other, because it's a movie like no other.  Francis Ford Coppola has crafted an incredible film which explores a soldier's decent into madness.  It would not have been as successful if the performances hadn't been top-notch.  Martin Sheen is fantastic as Willard.  We also have appearances from Harrison Ford and a very young Laurence Fishburne.  The two real standouts in this film are Robert DuVall as Kilgore and Marlon Brando as Colonel Kurtz.  DuVall gets the pleasure of having one of the most iconic lines in movie history:


Marlon Brando's character of Colonel Walter Kurtz doesn't actually show up until towards the end of the film, but his presence is felt throughout the entire picture. That's because Captain Willard's mission is to assassinate Kurtz.  But on the way, we start learning more about Kurtz and we start to understand why he went native, as it were.  It's a very interesting character study into how somebody with so much clout and so much power was able to manipulate his way into getting what he wanted.  His character takes on this kind of....father figure or savior for the local tribes and Brando's performance is nothing short of astounding.  He's very subdued and literally cloaked in shadow, but when he speaks, it's hypnotic.  Part of what makes the role so interesting is the way it was shot.  The shadows he was filmed in helped sell the character as mysterious.  It's a very effective technique.

A lot has been said about how troubled the production was when the film was being made.  There is a documentary on the latest Blu-Ray release called "Hearts of Darkness," which apparently goes into detail on how this film miraculously got completed.  Martin Sheen had a heart attack, Marlon Brando was overweight and doing his own thing, and a lot of the sets were destroyed during a typhoon in the Philippines where the film was shot.  I haven't actually seen the documentary yet, but when I do see it, I will review it.

One of the most unique things about this film was the soundtrack.  You had music from The Doors, Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries during the infamous helicopter raid, and the actual score from Coppola and his father Carmine really gave the film a bizarre and yet epic feel to the whole experience.  I loved it.  Apocalypse Now is one of those films that really defied expectations and went on to become one of the most iconic war films of the 20th century.  With outstanding performances from Martin Sheen, Robert DuVall and Marlon Brando, Apocalypse Now stands the test of time as a movie that explores the psychological effects of warfare on a soldier.  For fans of cinema, this is MANDATORY viewing.  It's an extraordinary piece of film-making and very important in terms of its scope and subject matter.  Movies rarely get better than this.  10/10.