Marinduque State College

School of Engineering
Department of ECE

A Film Review about the movie “Apocalypse Now”

A film that was taken and inspired from the novel “Heart of Darkness”. Moreover, it is a

film that was considered one of the greatest war movie in the history. Apocalypse Now is a film

directed, and produced by Francis Ford Colpolla, released on the year 1979 with movie length of

153 minutes. It is an epic war film that focuses on Vietnam War in particular and western

colonialism as a whole. The movie is not blatantly antiviolence, but it takes pains to expose the

mayhems of a war fought by the United States in the name of consensus and liberty. The movie’s

purpose is to inform everyone on how difficult is to be on a war, and how a war can create madness

within everyone, furthermore, this film is a allegory for a expedition into the self and displays how

the self, in the face of war, obscures beyond recognition. A film of how political wars can affect

one society producing an ethereal abuse in terms of emotional distress after war. Moreover, it is a

film depicting the elimination of a state’s ethics, attached with the portrayal of insanity and

disinterest as an outcome of political hostilities. To be more precise, the film impeccably shows

the emotional and psychological deterioration in every characters of the movie, especially for the

soldiers, together with the main antagonist and protagonist of the story. In all, “Apocalypse Now”

is a movie that can be characterized as a depiction of dehumanization, in which many innocent

lives have been taken, an embodiment of falseness; in the midst of pointless killings resulted by

the madness that cloaks everyone in darkness. Violence and abuse are really evident and have to

be expected in this movie as it was a truly epic war film.

 Marinduque State College
School of Engineering
Department of ECE

The main characters in the film were Martin Sheen as Captain Benjamin L. Willard, Marlon

Brando as Colonel Walter E. Kurtz, Robert Duvall as Lieutenant Colonel William Kilgore,

Frederick Forrest as Engineman 3rd Class Jay Hicks, Albert Hall as Chief Petty Officer George

Phillips, Sam Bottoms as Gunner’s Mate 3rd Class Lance B. Johnson, Laurence Fishburne as

Gunner’s Mate 3rd Class Tyrone “Mr. Clean” Miller, Dennis Hopper as one of the American

Photojournalist, G.D. Spradlin as Lieutenant General Corman, Jerry Ziesmer as Jerry, Harrison

Ford as Colonel Lucas, Scott Glenn as Captain Richard M. Colby, Bill Grahams as Agent, and R.

Lee Ermey as Helicopter Pilot. The opening of the film was in Saigon in 1968 where Army Captain

and special intelligence agent Benjamin Willard is holed up in a hotel room, heavily intoxicated

and desperate to get back into action. He was given a mission that no one has ever been giving

before. The task is to travel to upriver to eliminate a colonel, who is gone AWOL and acts like a

demi-god to group of tribal natives in Vietnam. Accepting the duty, Willard voyages upriver along

with a disparate group of American Soldiers. As they were on their journey, numerous hindrances

have come in their way, including a deadly happenstance with a tiger and heavy enemy fire at a

strategic bridge. As Willard nears the end of his mission, he soon finds himself reeling in the

horrors and sanity of war itself as he confronts the colonel face to face in which Willard’s true

nature begins to emerge slowly. As I notice, pivot-shot camera techniques are use which are really

essential in a fast change position of every scene, the sounds were really realistic and captivating

like the blades of helicopter flying by, the explosion were really realistic as I saw and hear the

sounds of bomb explosions and the guns fired by the soldier. The movie really focuses on

dehumanization bringing the psychological reality of war.

 Marinduque State College
School of Engineering
Department of ECE

The movie was really was an interesting one especially that it concerns with the effects of

war on every individuals. Francis Ford Colpolla was successful in achieving his purpose in such a

way that his movie greatly depicts the effects of war and conflicts on every individuals involved

in it, and can later cause madness and insanity, which can really be a wakeup call for everyone to

stop wars. Every part of the story, including the acting of every cast, the writing and even the

sounds were really effective, powerful and beautiful at its finest, especially Willard which is really

commendable one for his great acting prowess. The strength of the movie for me is that it is really

convincing in relaying information and does have really a moral lesson for everyone, but its

weakness is that it really focuses on violence which can really provoke everyone, especially those

nations who has conflict between them to start a war or battle. The movie was not dull, the truth is

it is really catchy and captivating, every scene were heart-pumping, and overall, the film was an

interesting one, and the main reason for that is that that every cast of the film played a job well

done. Truly, a societies’ cycle of life can change given the fact that war is involve in it. Imagine a

peaceful society then suddenly corrupted by a war, bringing madness and insanity to everyone,

surely it will have a great impacts to everyone who lives in a particular society involve in a war.

For me, I would really love to recommend this movie to everyone, even though this is released a

long time ago, the lessons and the impacts of it can really bring us to a much higher existence of

facts in this world, that war is really not a solution to any given problems. A movie that will really

wake everyone about what the world really is, and as I said, every inch of the movie was flawless,

interesting and really a highly recommendable one.

 Marinduque State College
School of Engineering
Department of ECE

As I have realized, and as what I’ve said, war cannot cause any good effects in everyone.

Maybe it can bring glory to one nation, but on the other hand, it can also mean the fall of another

nation. The movie had greatly left an impression of how difficult it is to be on a war, and how a

society can be highly affected by a conflict or war. If ever I were to rate this movie/film, and with

a rating of A-F, with A being the highest and F being the lowest, of course I would rate it A,

because as I said, I highly recommend this movie for everyone, because for sure, you will never

have single dull moments with it. The cinematographic techniques, the sound, the casting, the idea,

the plot of the story, and everything about it was perfect. If you don’t want to believe, then see for

yourself and then after watching it, start to reflect about it.