He's out there operating without any decent restraint, totally beyond the pale of any acceptable human conduct.

Rating: 8/10 (23 July 2000)

One of Kubrick's best and certainly the most gut-wrenching & cerebral films. This isn't your typical warfilm of "them and us" and it would be a mistake to think of this film in the same context as Platoon or SPR.
This is a far more implicit, personal tale of a Captain's insular view of a world finally gone mad - there are so many one-liners throughout the film that signpost to good effect the blatant contradictions of America's true purpose in this war - Kurtz is a top Colonel of the old school; a tactical genius who finally flips when his own side declares that he murdered rather than "killed" spies even though all the evidence pointed in his favour.
Other contradictions include the summary above - of a man who has gone beyond acceptable human conduct. And yet you get US aircraft dumping napalm on remote villages maiming women & children.
Sheen's Captain Willard's mind is full of these contradictions to the extent that he is gradually losing focus on what his true purpose is out there. His only solace is drugs & booze while praying/dreading the next mission: a mission into the heart of darkness.
The entire film is really nothing more than what is going on in Willard's deug induced chaotic mind - there are so many unbalanced things going on: kids surfing, tanning and listening to Jimi Hendrix, Bunny Girls appearing & disappearing out of the Heavens; a photo journalist high on drugs but full on poetic enlightenment!
Wherever he looks he sees conspiracy to cover up other people's concepts of indiscretion. Later he meets Lieutenant Kilgore (apt surname) supremely played by Duvell, who seems to consider finding the best time & place to surf more important than carrying out his mission. But even after one particular battle he comes reflective that very soon the war is going to end even though he "loves the smell of napalm in the morning". There is no happiness in his voice at the thought of the war ending, far from it, he wants it to last forever because that gives him (and perhaps many other one-dimensional officers) a purpose, a political (not moral) reason; an excuse to carry out their actions with impunity; and yet at the same time Willard has to hunt down & kill a decent General on a trumped up charge, because "he has gone beyond the pale"!
It goes on & on, the bulls__t never ends; and this is Coppola's message. American 4 star generals blame their own mistakes on others and want those mistakes "terminated with extreme prejudice". Kurtz proved to a thorn in their side and want him "terminated" but for not obeying orders to kill only those they want him to kill.
If you've seen the documentary you will be aware of how much time, effort & money (and health!) it took to get the printed word onto film and in my judgement it is perhaps the best movie indictment of America's protracted stay in Vietnam, and more specifically, Cambodia. (a film even Oliver Stone would be proud of)
The acting, with the exception of Brando, is truly breathtaking, especially from Sheen as a man high on booze & drugs and who can flip is normally cool manner with acts of sudden violence & aggression (the machine gun attack on the boat)
Brando, I feel, ruined the movie; more so when you read about his exploits off it. He really didn't give a s**t about the book or Coppola's vision, so the committment & acting you do finally see from him is really just bogus. The ending seemed like an afterthought and wasn't very well executed after such a long & dramatic beginning.
You have to see this film time & time again because it is an insane vision seen from an insane mind during and insane war where drugs or bullets are the only true means of escape.
If you want simplicity go see Platoon; if you want a guilty conscience on behalf of your own past Governments rent this and wonder how this could ever have been allowed to happen!

*****/*****