Apocalypse Now (1979)

Director: Francis Ford Coppola

Born in Detroit in 1939, Francis Ford Coppola left his mark as one of the most important and influential American directors inside the cinematographic sphere. He is one of the most prominent figures in the movement known as New Hollywood, which was influenced by movements such as the Italian Neorealism and the Nouvelle Vague. 

The New Hollywood is characterized by the empowerment of filmmakers above the producers of major studios, and by the representation of subjects that were considered as taboo in those years, such as explicit violence and sexual themes.

The movement took place from the mid-1960s to the early 1980s, with filmmakers such as Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, Brian De Palma being its protagonists among others. Ford Coppola has filmed outstanding classics during this time, such as The Great Gatsby (1974) or The Godfather (1972), which would later become a legendary trilogy.

But now the year is 1979. Major Hollywood studios were totally disinterested in making a movie about Vietnam, because the United States lost the most controversial war in their history. The country had very fresh physical and psychological wounds that the war had left on its people, and that is when Ford Coppola brought up his eighth feature film entitled Apocalypse Now, a titanic film based on the novel Heart of Darkness (1899) by Joseph Conrad. Coppola had serious difficulties finding a protagonist for this film, acclaimed actors of the time such as Al Pacino and Jack Nicholson refused to take the lead in the film. So in the end, he bet for an unknown actor, Martin Sheen.

The film begins with the presence of Captain Benjamin Willard (Martin Sheen), who is completely immobilized in a Saigon hotel, exploring and analyzing his loneliness through an optical lens of traumas that the war has left on him. Meanwhile, Jim Morrison’s mystical and mesmerizing voice increases its tone and intensity through the Doors song “The End“, encapsulating a series of bizarre and paralyzing thoughts that we absorbe through our senses.

Soon, Benjamin is required to carry out a very dangerous mission; his task will be to cross the river and enter the depths of the Cambodian Jungle, in order to find Colonel Kurtz (Marlon Brando). Colonel Kurtz is a mythical character which got involved in an unexplored environment that oscillates between the solitude of the jungle and the brutality of the war. Now, Kurtz has become the leader of a community inside the depths of the jungle, a following made up of natives of the area and deserted Vietnamese soldiers. He acts as a dictator of this varied and chilling community, and all of its habitants revere him as a God.

The developments revolve around the journey undertaken by Captain Willard and his four companions along the Nung River, in search of Kurtz’s refuge. The monstrous and gigantic journey is a brutal self-discovery for Willard, since he begins to identify and obsess with the life-story and identity of Kurtz. At some point we are drawn into Nietzsche‘s phrase: “And if you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you”.

The search becomes a descent into the gloom and an abandonment of civilization, we witness a painful observation of the aftermaths that the war left. The soldiers have changed radically, every glimpse of humanity has been consumed, and the goodness that existed in their souls has been replaced by an irremediable dissociation with reality. The odyssey takes shape and is accompanied by a sublime score, such as Richard Wagner‘s “The Ryde of the Valkyries”. 

The realism is gradually reduced, and suddenly we are immersed into delirious, surreal, and beautifully dreamlike scenes, with references to the book “The Golden Bough” by James Frazer (1890). The film becomes an apocalypse that triggers disasters under a phantasmagoric approach, which radiates hallucinogenic and sick fantasies, making the jungle an exquisite theatre, a place were we feel alive. 

Irish writer Oscar Wilde said that in this world there are only two great tragedies: One is not getting what you want, and the other one is getting it. After finding Kurtz, Captain Williard’s supposed victory and salvation reveals itself as tragedy. Our days and our most decisive experiences are a fragile structure against the hungry jaws of the unexplored and feared nature, which gradually begins to devour us.

by Octavio Carbajal González