Apocalypse Now
Spoilers! I agree with many that 1979's APOCALYPSE NOW was director Francis Coppola's last truly great film, one that followed his three other masterpieces in a decade filled with them. I have seen it several times since I was about twelve and it only gets more astonishing. The power has not diminished even a trifle, and its themes grow more salient with time. Writer John Milius and Coppola sought to use Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness as a framework upon which they could splash their feelings about the insanity of Vietnam, but it goes much deeper. Conrad's title alone explains it. The men in this film all have black hearts. Even the green teenagers on the Navy patrol boat that take Captain Willard up the Nung River to find the wayward Col. Kurtz, who has succumbed to the insanity and created his own splinter kingdom of war and death. Willard (Martin Sheen) has done a few tours and even been home, which for him exists in name only. He finds his meanin...
