The standard by which all war films should be judged

Rating: 10/10 (17 March 2005)

In the 1960s, the Indochine conflict that had been raging for most of the twentieth century finally boiled over into the Vietnam War. America went into this war with a tribal, technologically underdeveloped people, firm in the belief that if they committed enough weaponry and soldiers to the battle, the conflict could be won quickly. Obviously, they were wrong, and one of the many things that Apocalypse Now does brilliantly is illustrate some of the reasons why. One officer of the Viet Cong army, I forget who, told the Americans that they would get tired of the war before the Vietnamese do.
This absolute chaos was reflected in the production of Apocalypse Now. Taking over a year to shoot, and around three years to massage into a shape for release, it has become the definitive war epic, not just for a generation, but for all time. Part of this stems from the fact that it is neither pro-Vietnamese nor pro-American, but simply telling the story of one man's terrible journey, leaving the viewer to make up their own mind what to take from it. This is in spite of a fairly slow, even languid pace, and even the great possibility in the late 1970s that it might never be released at all.
In 2001, Francis Ford Coppola released a new version of his masterpiece, complete with a remixed soundtrack and forty-nine minutes of footage that had not been integrated into the cut when the distributors, getting nervous about the production woes, demanded that Coppola release something to the public. The resulting 153-minute cut was hailed as one of the best war films ever made. In spite of this, it did show a little incoherence at times. Scenes seemed to jump from one to another without transition. So the 202-minute Redux addressed this in two ways. First, it obviously added a good deal of footage that gave more development and background to many of the characters, especially Martin Sheen's burned out Captain. It also reorganised existing footage into an order that made somewhat more sense. The scene in which we are introduced to Robert Duvall's insane airborne commander now flows much more smoothly, to cite the best example.
In a much lesser film, it is said that a dream of one war is a dream of all wars. Apocalypse Now is a great expression of this fact. By proxy of a fictional report on the war's progress, we are told in different words that unless we adapt ourselves to our battlefield, victory is impossible. We are also told how technology and manpower alone will not win wars. The film more or less tells us that commitment is far more important in the key to winning a war, and this seems to be a lesson that America is still struggling to learn. If anything, Apocalypse Now is more relevant today than it was in 1979. We are still lying to ourselves, our fearless leaders still lie to us, and we still have the same delusions we call morality.
Strangely enough, Apocalypse Now's signature scene comes early in the piece. The flight of the helicopters over the village to the tune of Wagner's Ride Of The Valkyries is so memorable that the two have literally become one. Many a listener can no longer hear the music without thinking of the film. Unlike many other films, the contemporary music used here also perfectly complements the on screen action. Hearing Jim Morrison sing "can you picture what will be?" as helicopter flybys fade into Martin Sheen resting in a Saigon hotel is one thing that convinced me contemporary music could work in films that were not themed around it. Matter of fact, some of the music heard in this film is just as haunting as the story being told. Which is saying quite a lot.
Not only is Apocalypse Now one of the best war films ever made, it is also one of the best adaptations of existing source material ever made. In this case, the film is somewhat loosely based upon the Joseph Conrad novel Heart Of Darkness. Rather than attempt to create a word-for-word adaptation, Coppola transplants the story into what was then a modern setting and embellishes it with all the things that setting allows. As a result, we have something here that stands head and shoulders above other adaptations of novels set in the Vietnam war. Just watch the eerie, surreal bridge sequence here, and compare it with the sniper hunt sequence in the truly abysmal Full Metal Jacket. The difference in quality when a filmmaker is willing to put his health and sanity on the line to capture that authentic feel of a world gone utterly mad. Forget the Windtalkers or Saving Private Ryans, this is as close as one will ever get to live warfare on the screen.
I gave Apocalypse Now a ten out of ten. In spite of flawed editing in its original incarnation, it deserves this rating in both the original and Redux edits. Like RoboCop or X-Men 2, it simply must be preserved as a record of the world's mentality at the time it was made. It is a classic that every storyteller should study intently. You have not truly seen the dark side of humanity until you have seen Apocalypse Now.