"I love the smell of napalm in the morning" : Apocalypse Now (Redux)

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This is probably one of the greatest and darkest films of all times. Darkness, madness and hallucinatory images of Hell pervade this stunning, mind-blowing film set in the Vietnam War. Francis Ford Coppola directs yet another masterpiece.

It also has one of the greatest sequences ever shot on film. "The Ride of the Valkyries" blaring while the helicopters assault the Vietcong forces is absolutely awe-inspiring.

Since many don't know the film's story, I will post a synopsis from an Apocalypse Now website:

" Saigon, ****. I'm still only in Saigon." The journey into the heart of darkness begins in a hotel room in Saigon, Vietnam. US Army Captain Willard (Martin Sheen) of 505. battalion, 173 Airborne, assigned SOG, also an CIA operative and an assasin, is waiting for an mission. He is haunted by his earlier deeds and he is getting very drunk. Willard smashes the mirror while fighting himself and cuts his hand. He collapses on the bed weeping.

In the morning Willard is brought from the hotel to a briefing in Nha Trang. At present are General Corman , Colonel Lucas (Harrison Ford) and a civilian (Jerry Ziesmer, assistant director of the film) . He receives orders to infiltrate renegade special forces Colonel Kurtz's troops and terminate his command. "Terminate with extreme prejudice." Kurtz is said to have gone totally insane, he runs his own private army in the jungle in Cambodia and is worshipped as a god by a native tribe. Kurtz is charged of executing vietnamese intelligence agents who he said were double agents. Kurtz' troops are however very successful in fighting North Vietnamese and Vietkong but his methods are considered to be "unsound".


Willard travels to Kurtz's camp up Nung river to Cambodia in a Navy patrol boat with a rather weird boat crew : Mr.Clean, a guy from Bronx. " Light and space of Vietnam really put the zap on his brain." Chef, a real chef, a saucier, from New Orleans, a very nervous guy. Lance Johnson, a well known surfer from Los Angeles and Chief Philips, the commander of the boat. On this surrealistic journey a lot of strange things happen. Willard is being helped by a manic air cavalry commander Lieutenant Colonel Kilgore ( Robert Duvall ), who really loves surfing. His troops blow up a Vietkong village, with Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries blasting from the speakers, to help Willard but mostly because there are pretty good waves and he wants to see Lance surfing. After calling a napalm attack on Vietkong troops in the jungle Kilgore confesses his love for the smell of napalm. And, yes.. Charlie don't surf !


After this ordeal the journey continues to a navy base by the river. They get more supplies and witness a chaotic and absurd show by Playboy playmates in the middle of nowhere. In the boat Willard reads Kurtz' dossier. There is a letter Kurtz has sent to his son, where he explains his actions :

Dear son,

"I'm afraid that both you and your mother would have been worried for not hearing from me these past weeks. But my situation here has become a difficult one. I've been officially accused of murder by the army. The alleged victims were four Vietnamese double agents. We spent months uncovering and accumalating evidence. When absolute proof was completed, we acted, we acted like soldiers. The charges are unjustified. They are in fact, under the circumstances of this conflict quite completely insane.

In a war there are many moments for compassion and tender action. There are many moments for ruthless action, for what is often called ruthless. But many and many circumstances, the only clarity; seeing clearly what there is to be done and doing it directly, quickly, awake... , looking at it.

I would trust you to tell your mother what you choose about this letter. As for the charges, I'm unconcerned. I'm beyond their lying morality. And so I'´m beyond caring.

You have all my faith.

Your loving father."

The following scene is one of the most po

 

I have only seen a few minutes of the movie, but I have read Heart of Darkness and do know a bit about the creation of the movie, which is probably as fascinating as the film itself. I was actually going to go rent this movie tomorrow, what a coincidence!

Did'ja know that throughout the entire filming (and lack of filming) of the movie, Scorcesi was threatening to commit suicide? And during the opening scene in the hotel room, Sheen wasn't supposed to break the mirror and hurt his hand, but he was too drunk and high to know what he was doing, and the crew was too high and stoned to know to stop the camera, and Scorcezi was too depressed to stop and get a doctor in to help Sheen and re-do the scene.

Has anyone seen "Hearts of Darkness" which is about Apocalypse Now, and has all the "behind the scene" information of the filmins?

 

I love that film, it's one of my favourites. Francis Ford Coppola is my favourite director of all time.

The cinematography is flawless in it (every shot is something to gaze at, even Marlon Brando's bald scaly head), the acting is great, the direction supreme and it's a very intriguing and exhilarating film.

But watching it often drains me because it's such a dark film.

The only problem I have with the film is Marlon Brando's moronic behaviour when we meet Kurtz at the end. Granted he has to show how the war can make people mad but at that point in the film I feel I don't care because I've already seen enough of 'the horror...the horror'. I do love that line 'How does it smell to you, soldier?' though, and when he calls Dennis Hopper 'MUTT!' and flings a book at him.
I do also listen with interest to when he talks about the innoculation in a village and the home soldiers cutting the childrens' arms off just because they would never take help from the enemy. That is vile, but he takes it as a form of America being weak, as they could never do that, and in not doing so they become hypocrites.

I think the buildup towards Kurtz is great and he is only very slightly disappointing when we see him at the end. Otherwise it is a flawless movie.

The whole thing I think is about hypocrisy.

Oh and in response to the 2nd poster, yes I've seen Hearts of Darkness, and after watching it, it made me think of Coppola as more of a visionary genius than ever before, the second Orson Welles as it were (after all Welles wanted to adapt Heart of Darkness himself a long time before Coppola).

Finally on the note of the Redux version, I think all the additions work except the French Plantation scene and maybe the extra playmates bit.

The French Plantation begins very nicely with the white smoke everywhere and then Clean's funeral. But when they all sit down to dinner and start talking about capitalism I can't bear it. Coppola's trying to put out these themes in the film, of a community trying to comment on a society it no longer knows anything about, and things like that, but to see that is actually so dull. And then Willard's night with the woman I suppose shows how he has let go of his old family, but it's so damn tangential to the actual story (I guess war is like that).
And the Playboy scene is obviously nice for some reasons but doesn't add anything. They are meant to be counterparts to Willard's crew as people exploited by society but these kinds of themes are meant to be thought about in retrospect.

Anyway I may just be talking rubbish, but these are my views.

 

Great film. The Redux edition was weird, but cool none the less...

 

Probably the best film of all time. Redux sucked though.

 

My favorite sequences are with Robert Duvall as Col. Kilgore. "Charlie don't surf!"

 

I watched this for the first time last Thursday and I have to say that it was amazing. Just showing how war can turn innocent people that steal a surfboard for fun into paranoid psychos,eg Lance, is great.

 

I loved this film. I've only seen the Redux version, and I must agree the French Plantation scene is pointless and boring. It extends the film by what, 20 mintues? Unecessary.
For the other parts, it is a mix of exuberant and dark visual (those forests ARE meant to be evil) and sheer madness. When they begin to see the corpses and the heads... God damn. I wish I could have seen it in a theater.

 

I must agree the French Plantation scene is pointless and boring. It extends the film by what, 20 mintues? Unecessary.

well, i haven't seen Redux, and i'm really skeptical about the plantation scene myself, but i became less skeptical when i heard FFC's explanation of where it fits into the mythic structure of the film, so i thought i would share that here.

basically, the plantation scene comes after the bridge scene, which is the gate to the Underworld, but before they reach Kurtz, who is Hades or Death or the Devil. the Frenchwoman is a ghost or shade in the underworld, carrying warnings from those long dead (the French colonials) to turn back before it's too late.

 

If you want to see Apocalypse Now... then for the love of God SKIP REDUX. What a diaster. The extra hour added nothing to the movie. It totally killed pacing and made the film way too long. The having sex with Playboy bunnies and the French Plantation scenes were godawful and better left on the cutting room floor.