Please stop mr. coppola

Rating: 10/10 (5 December 2019)

Enough is enough. And as a viewer, I can not care for the reasons why?! Godfather and Godfather II were perfect movies with true sadness and melancholia. Godfather II was an even better movie than the first Godfather.
Then came Godfather III and destroyed, completely destroyed the legacy of Godfather and Godfather II. The ending in Godfather II with Michael sitting alone on a bench at the lake was a stroke of genius, but then came Godfather III where Copolla allowed and old unmotivated Al Pacino to give the character Michael a completely different personality that destroyed the character of Michael in part I and II.
IF YOU HAVE NEVER WATCH THE GODFATHER TRIOLIGY MAKE SURE YOU NEVER WATCH PART III - Then all will be fine and you will forever love Mr. Francis Ford Coppola.
The first Apocalypse Now was PERFECT - SIMPLY PERFECT. THE BEST FILM EVER MADE in my honest opinion.
I for one particularly like the version where Kurtz compound gets bombed and burned during the end credits making you wonder if Willard did or didn't call in the airstrike... JUST PERFECT. FULL STOP.
Then came REDUX and destroyed the legacy of Apocalypse Now. FULL STOP. And let me tell you, the difference between REDUX and the FINAL CUT version of Apocalypse Now is simply ridiculous and therefore to me, it is no better than the REDUX version. I was watching FINAL CUT in IMAX, of course, and in the back of my mind, I was hoping that Copolla had gone back to the original version... hmm... he hadn't... hmm...
If you ever watched THE MAKING OF Apocalypse Now it would be much easier for you to understand what I am about to explain. Nevertheless, let me try.
EVERYTHING from the French plantation scenes never made it to the original version of Apocalypse Now. In THE MAKING OF Apocalypse Now we see a very angry and frustrated Francis Ford Coppola explaining the cast and crew of his film that they should all forget about this part of the movie. Erase it from their minds (not sure this were his exact words...) since he already then knew he was never going to use it. That he hated it and that it was completely misplaced in his vision of Apocalypse Now.
For years I always wondered what he meant and what those scenes at the French plantation were all about?! Then I watch the REDUX version and finally understood what he was talking about in THE MAKING OF Apocalypse Now. The scenes at the French plantation were made to explain a political and pseudointellectual view of why wars are the unnecessary stupidity of the human race. If the audience weren't clever enough to understand the antiwar message from the original version, well then, the scenes at the French plantation would spell it out for you.
Also, the funeral of Clean with a torn and burned US-flag seems utterly ridiculous and misplaced together with the dreamlike short fling between Willard and the French widow. If you have watched the original version over and over again, as I did for many, many years, you will understand why Francis Ford Coppola was frustrated and angry, asking the cast and crew to forget that they ever shot those scenes. It's like if you are listening to Beethovens Fifth symphony and suddenly a romantic piece of music composed by Mozart is being played in between the movements composed by Beethoven... It just erupts the whole experience of the Fifth symphony.
Also, important, are the added scenes of Kilgore trying to hunt down Willard and his men because of his stolen surfboard. Ridiculous scenes that fortunately didn't make it into the original version of Apocalypse Now.
Also, in the original, Willard never tries to befriend or become social with the crew on the boat. He is a loner doing his business in as much secrecy as possible, making the movie more dark and realistic. In REDUX and the FINAL CUT he has his laughs and tries bounding with the rest of the crew, making scenes like shooting the Vietnamese woman who runs for her puppet more unbelievable, since logically, he couldn't react like this towards his new comrades on the boat, as an example.
And I could continue. The scenes where they find the Bunny girls raped and drugged are also completely misplaced in REDUX, but thankfully cut out again in the FINAL CUT...
Had Francis Ford Coppola only had the courage to let the FINAL CUT go back to the original version. The young people of today who weren't even born back in 1979 could have experienced a real masterpiece rather than this interrupted symphony. What a complete shame Mr. Coppola - You missed a chance of a lifetime...
So, my final thoughts. REDUX and FINAL CUT are both BIG NO-NOs, but the ORIGINAL from 1979, in my modest, but honest opinion, STILL IS THE BEST MOVIE IN THE HISTORY OF PLANET EARTH.
FULL STOP.
(So, if you have never watched Apocalypse Now, then stay away from the darkness in the movie theaters and find an old copy of the original Apocalypse Now from 1979. Preferable the version where Kurtz's compound is being bombed during the end credits... and don't ever watch the REDUX or FINAL CUT versions.)