Classic Review: Apocalypse Now (1979)

 Contains some spoilers for the film, if you haven’t seen it go see it.

          Last night I got to see the (fairly) new released Final Cut of Francis Ford Coppola’s masterpiece, Apocalypse Now, on the big screen at Sheffield’s own Film Unit Cinema. I’d seen the film once before with an edit unseen to most people, in year eleven history class with my teacher omitting any of the film’s darker scenes, intercut with parts from Platoon. A less than ideal way to watch. Going into the Final Cut last night I had almost forgotten most of the film apart from some of the most well known scenes. It was the first time I’d gotten to sit down and enjoy the film in one sitting, with Coppola’s final vision of it. I was not disappointed. 

          As the lights went down and the screen widened, I could hear the drones of helicopters moving from left to right on the surround speakers behind me. Then the start of The Doors’ The End. I was in Vietnam, 1969. A beautiful opening. The cross dissolves immediately create the dreamlike and hallucinogenic feel I associate most with the film. We are shortly introduced to Benjamin Willard, played perfectly by Martin Sheen (who himself was struggling with a drinking problem). It’s with this character who we stay with for the entire film, a Captain struggling to differentiate the fantasy from the reality. He is tasked with entering Cambodia and assassinating the disgraced Colonel, Walter E. Kurtz. 

          We are then plunged straight into the heart of darkness on a Huey helicopter backed by Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries. A truly phenomenal scene, but a complicated one. It simultaneously makes a spectacle out of a brutal example of the force of the US army, but also acts as a cynical criticism of American patriotism. Themes that I believe run throughout the film and are carried over from Joseph Conrad’s original novella. This whole attack is an ugly spectacle. It’s so easy to get lost in thought about the films production as you stare into the background. I desperately want to know how some of this is shot because some of it looks like real footage of the conflict. It is an absolute triumph in filmmaking.

          The second act is where I believe the film is at it’s best, as the boat makes it way up the Tonle Srepok. The film is at it’s most philosophical in these parts and I love it. Shot beautifully, the restoration does it full justice. Something I really appreciated was the careful construction of the soundscape, especially in the quieter scenes. It’s simply transportive. I think it could be one of the most immersive films I’ve ever seen. 

          The Final Cut features the infamous French Plantation sequence which Coppola routinely decides it either shouldn’t be included or it should. I don’t have a massive problem with this, but the pace of the film is undeniably harmed by it. In my opinion it should be left as a bonus feature. Saying that though I haven’t seen the other cuts in full so can’t fully confirm my preferred version. 

          As the film draws to it’s close, we are introduced to Kurtz himself played by Marlon Brando. This performance is one of my favourite things about the film, the way his introduction is shot is one of the great moments of cinema. The strips of light slowly introducing us to this hulkish figure. It’s hard to tell what was improvised/written on set or what was part of the original screenplay, but the writing shines here. As Willard completes his mission, killing Kurtz with multiple machete slashes, one of the greatest lines in cinematic history is uttered. “The horror…the horror.” I got chills.

          Apocalypse Now is lightning in a bottle filmmaking. Regardless of the many production problems and mishaps (Francis Ford Coppola threatened suicide and suffered from an epileptic fit due to the stress) it’s final product remains an important milestone in Coppola’s career, cinema, and society as a whole. A meditation on morality and humanity that remains as important today as it was when it was released. I believe this will be the case for many, many years to come.

           5/5.