Movie 202/1001 ~ Apocalypse Now

Filmed in 1979 (with great difficulty), Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now is consistently rated among the very best war movies ever made. Loosely based on the Conrad's novella Heart of Darkness, the movie is about Captain Willard's (Charlie Sheen) mission deep into neutral Cambodia during the Vietnam war to terminate Kurtz (Marlon Brando) who is alleged to have gone insane. The film also stars Laurence Fishburne, Dennis Hopper, Harrison Ford, and Robert Duvall. The movie is really about man's descent into darkness and insanity and the blurring of justice in a war like Vietnam's. I quite enjoyed the first half of the film as it was very compelling and visually stunning. As they get closer to Kurtz, the film gets darker and tries to reflect the madness of everything. The second half of the movie was still good, but I didn't like it as much as I did the first.

"I love the smell of napalm in the morning."

***1/2