The horror the horror...

Rating: 10/10 (7 November 2019)

My dad first saw this movie 40 years ago in its limited release at the now changed Ziegfeld theater in midtown manhattan in 70mm Dolby Stereo 5.1, the first movie to be mixed in that format which is still used today in digtal form. I saw it on vhs and tv then got the dvd which is a two disc set containing the theatrical cut split into two discs and apocalpyse now redux which is the extended version in both the 70mm aspect ratio as intended by its photographer. The remastered bluray release and the 4k final cut is the scope ratio that most people saw in wide release and on tv and i'll have to watch the final cut to see if its the best version of this movie, which was originally penned at six hours before Copolla cut it down to around 3 hours. The film became Copolla's most provacative work a year after The Deer Hunter won for best picture, becoming the first but not last movie based on Vietnam to win an Oscar. A documentary borrowing a title from the novel that inspired this movie, Heart of Darkness, was made for vhs and became a hit. The soundtrack also is well known, featuring 60s songs including The End by the doors, eight years after Morrison died in his bathub after taking drugs. Laurence Fishburne makes his film debut in this movie and this film is not for kids.