One of the most infamous scenes in "Apocalypse Now" is with Colonel Kilgore, played by Robert Duvall, and the air cavalry attacking a North Vietnamese village accompanied by Vagner's "Ride of the Valkyries". This action packed sequence is a pyrotechnic display of real explosions, climaxing with the napalm bombing of the jungle. However, the impact of this scene is Colonel Kilgore's character whose very eccentric nature drives the air cavalry to conduct such strange behavior as attacking a North Vietnamese Village in order to surf its beaches. Kilgore and his air cavalry represent the American machismo with her big guns and high tech equipment consuming nature itself. The scene in which the air cavalry is introduced shows a vehicle that rises out of the water with teeth painted on it consuming a house, and later on as it transports Vietnamese refugees it seems to swallow them up inside its mouth. In this same scene Kilgore is shown counting dead Viet Cong bodies using "death cards" to make sure the enemy knows who killed its men. Kilgore stops counting to give a dying Viet Cong soldier water from his canteen claiming "any man with brave enough to fight with one hand strapping in his guts can drink from my canteen any day." However, once he hears that a member of Willard's crew is a famous surfer he seemingly altogether forgets about the "brave soldier" and leaves him without water. Kilgore is the living form of the American war ethic, fighting gloriously while trying to hold onto his morality. He is insane. Kilgore's lunacy is fully illuminated in his famous speech about napalm, one of the horrors of Vietnam, in which he utters the famous lines, "I love the smell of napalm in the morning smells like victory." Another indicator of Kilgore's derangement is his obsession with surfing. An added scene in "Redux" shows Willard stealing Kilgore's prize surfboard, and in desperation to get it back Kilgore sends his helicopters up and down the river with a recording requesting its return. In his narration afterwards Willard cites, "If that's how Kilgore fought the war, I began to wonder what they had against Kurtz. It wasn't just insanity and murder. There was enough of that to go around for everyone." The only difference between Kilgore and Kurtz is that Kilgore is killing the American way, whereas Kurtz has decided to leave the system to fight his own war-punishable by death.      While briefing Willard on his mission, the general explains to him, "every man has his breaking point". The Sampan massacre sequence is the breaking point for Chef and Lance of Willard's patrol boat. While doing a routine check for smuggled goods, a girl rushes to protect something in the sampan causing the crew to fire upon the boat killing everyone in it. When looking to see what she was smuggling, they find a small puppy dog. This massacre pushes Lance over the edge as he claims ownership over the puppy, which marks the onset of his drug induced derangement. Chef, who discovers the puppy, loses sight of his lofty dreams and the shame debases his morale pushing the limits of his sanity. Meanwhile, the girl seems to be alive and according to policy the crew intends to transport her to a hospital. However, in one of the more shocking scenes of the film, Willard steps in and shoots her in the head forcing the patrol boat onward. From that point forward the film falls into irrecoverable darkness.      The Do Lung bridge sequence is one in which the psychedelic experience of Vietnam appears. This sequence is a prime example of why the Academy awarded Vittorio Storaro's the Oscar for best cinematography. Shot at night, the brilliant colors illuminating the darkness along side Carmine Coppola's score creates a haunted aura, mimicking the strange effects of LSD. The Do Lung Bridge represents the end of civilization, beyond which is "only Kurtz". The last stand that the US armed forces can muster in front of the carnal darkness. Willard leaves the boat along with Lance who has "dropped acid", to survey the area and gather intelligence. As he searches for the commanding officer he finds African-American teenagers stuck in trenches seemingly battling with darkness itself, as the enemy is never seen. The darkness oppresses everything in the shot as the occasional flare brilliantly lights up the sky, only to fade away in the distance. The artificial lighting on set was not enough, so the crew had to continually set off ammunition and flares to create enough lighting for the camera to pick up. This method creates the perfect atmosphere, making the scene chaotic and dreamlike, as the soldiers get high and listen to Jimi Hendrix. Willard realizes that there isn't a commanding officer at Do Lung and all of the American soldiers have been damned to die in "the asshole of the world". As the patrol boat passes, parts of the bridge explode as the America soldiers are soldering it together. "Every night we build up this bridge and then Charlie blows it right back up again." Civilization cannot stand against the might of the jungle as the patrol boat continues up the river that "seemed to lead into the heart of an immense darkness."
						next
		back