Review Tuesday: Apocalypse Now (1979)

  

 

Apocalypse Now

(1979)

An assassin is sent to take out a rogue Colonel. 

It seems I have been on some war kick lately. From the horrors of the WW1 trenches, to the horrors of Vietnam. This is something I have a half-memory of watching, at least in part, on television when I was a child. Yeah, I am old enough to remember when movies would hit network television, FREE, in about a couple years. Of course, a movie, being two and a half hours long would get mutilated by censors, and have commercials inserted in the worst possible spots. So, I am pretty happy I got to watch this in all its glory, uncut. 

 

 

 

Directed by Francis Ford Coppola, APOCALYPSE NOW is this insane journey of violence through Vietnam. An all-star cast brings you the story of Captain Benjamin L. Willard (Martin Sheen) being sent on a mission to assassinate Colonel Walter E. Kurtz (Marlon Brando). And why was this man marked for death? He went rogue and did his job better than the eggheads in Washington were ordering the troops to do. They can't let Kurtz get away with that!

    

 

How do you review this? It's just one horrific / surreal scene after another. The odd part, all the most famous scenes and quotes aren't with Kurtz, it was by Robert Duvall as Lt. Col Bill Kilgore. The gunships? Wagner? Airstrikes? The smell of napalm in the morning? ALL KILGORE. In a 2.5 hour movie he might've had five minutes of screen-time. MAYBE. Yet, those were the most ICONIC scenes of the movie. AND as unhinged as Kilgore was, he was doing in under the direction of Washington, so he was fine! Kurtz? He was just next level. Godlike in a land that wasn't even his. So HE couldn't be allowed to get away with that. 

This movie was one of the most engaging films I have seen in a while. Yet, as horrific as the depictions were, I am certain the actually Vietnam conflict was much worse. I could see it in the faces of my friends who were over there. 

 

 

 

But I digress...

 

This is hailed as one of the greatest films and with good reason. It's outstanding. If you haven't gotten around to seeing it, yet, you should. Unless you have a weak stomach, then this might not be the movie for you. 

 

AMAZON