THE IMMENSE DARKNESS: A SCENE BY SCENE SYNOPSIS AND ANAYLSIS OF 'APOCALYPSE NOW REDUX' by Jason Coe
		During a press conference at the Cannes Film Festival of 1979, Francis Ford Coppola said that his film "Apocalypse Now" was not about the Vietnam War, it was the Vietnam War. The film would go onto share the prestigious Palme d'Or award. This would prove to be the anti-climatic ending to a harrowing experience for Coppola and his crew who had spent 2 years in the jungles of the Philippines filming and another 2 years in the editing room. Coppola himself had mortgaged his own home in Napa to finance the film and retain rights to the film and its production. This was Coppola's personal Vietnam in which he had invested his life and sanity, and emerging from those depths he had his epic magnum opus that had changed him forever. Twenty years later Coppola was sitting in a hotel room and happened to catch his film on television. From this viewing he realized that audiences were ready for the grander epic that he had watered down in 1979.  "What struck me was that the original film-which had been seen as so demanding, strange and adventurous when it first came out-now seemed relatively tame, as though the audience had caught up to it." This coupled with many calls he had received advocating re-releasing the film along with the cut scenes inspired the release of "Apocalypse Now Redux" at Cannes in 2001. This new release boasted an impressive added 43 minutes, redone score, and an impressive technicolor dye transfer that emboldens the color of the film. Most importantly, "Redux" was entirely cut from the original 5 hours of film. The result is an entirely new film that Coppola feels really represents his vision separate from worries concerning financial stress and audience reception. The end result is a much more continuous film that is much longer but seems shorter. With the release of "Redux", many critics feel as though one of the greatest films of all time has been perfected.      The story line of "Apocalypse Now" is based on a loose adaptation of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness. Willard is a covert Special Forces officer specializing in assassination. He is sent on a top-secret mission by the CIA to travel down the Nung river in a Navy Patrol boat into Cambodia and "terminate with extreme prejudice" Colonel Walter E. Kurtz. Played by Marlon Brando, Kurtz is a renegade officer that has gone insane and is leading a montagnard army of natives and soldiers against the Viet Cong. The story unfolds as Willard journeys down the river and slowly loses his sanity, preparing for the coming confrontation with Kurtz.      The film begins with a shot of the jungle seen through wafts of cloudy yellow smoke with partial views of helicopters flying through  Ironically, the film begins with "the end" (especially remixed by the Doors)  as the sound of the helicopters blades are incorporated as the baseline of the song. And perfectly on cue as Jim Morrison's voice begins "this is the end beautiful friend", the jungle green explodes in a fiery napalm attack symbolizing the destruction of nature. As the shot begins to pan to the right and left, Willard, played by Martin Sheen, is shown upside down juxtaposed with a ceiling fan that rhythmically aligns itself with the helicopter rotors. As the shot continues Willard is then paralleled with a giant stone Buddha that is right side up with the destruction of the napalm raging in the background. This opposition foreshadows the future in which the Buddha will exact its vengeance for nature's loss. As the background destruction fades, Willard's voice begins background narration while the shot shows Willard in a Saigon hotel room. The following sequence shows Willard in the throes of drunkenness battling with his own personal demon as he is seen punching a mirror and lying naked on sheets stained by his own blood. Normally, such a scene would be viewed as quite melodramatic, however, the ingenuity of this sequence that moves the viewer is that Sheen's performance is not a performance. Coppola felt as though Sheen was having trouble "becoming Willard", which deeply troubled him because he knew that the audience had to believe Willard because he is the eyes of the audience in the story. Coppola had a dream in which he was filming the hotel scene with Sheen and he told Sheen to admire himself in the mirror and suddenly Sheen became Willard. Inspired, Coppola decided to take a risk and allow Sheen to become intoxicated much like Willard is in the story. As the night progressed, each take seemed to take on its own character as Sheen fell more and more into himself. In the final take of the night, Sheen began to look at himself in the mirror while doing judo stances, and suddenly he punched the mirror cutting his own hand. Sheen ordered them to continue rolling as Coppola coached Sheen from the side. They continued rolling and recorded Sheen's drunken nightmare showing the very real pain of Sheen/Willard. To this day, Sheen is unable to watch this scene out of fear. The incredible intimacy of this opening scene awakens the audience to the immense pain that Willard and countless other Vietnam veterans experienced. This insight into Willard's character is quite important because his journey is the viewer's journey, and his change is the viewer's change. In order to emphasize the Willard's disillusionment, Willard never looks directly into the camera. His gaze is always lost somewhere, very much like his soul
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