Director: Francis Ford Coppola
Cast: Martin Sheen, Robert Duvall, Marlon Brando
Rating: R  disturbing violent images, language, sexual content, drug use

Oh, youth culture, why hast thou forsaken me? I remember the days when VHS was king, and DVD was an H.G. Wells’ fantasy dream. Not so today. I was in search of the redone version of Francis Ford Coppola’s masterpiece (and mental undoing) “Apocalypse Now: Redux.” Everywhere I went, I found plethoric piles of Apocalypse DVDs, but not a trace of VHS. Out of desperation, I turned to a clerk at one of those electronic warehouses that’s supposed to carry everything (as long as it’s not vintage). Of course, the search found nothing, since the company didn’t carry “antiques.”

The clerk’s post comment made me realize that I’m definitely getting on in years. I actually felt like fitting myself with a blue haired wig. “I didn’t much like ‘Apocalypse Now’,” the young whippersnapper told me. “It didn’t have enough action.”

Action? Oh woe is me. My mind fleeted like a Harley drag race, a thousand expressions pouring through my brain. If I had a few hours (and a way to superglue the kid’s feet to the showroom floor), I would have told him a thing or 20 about great cinema.

“Apocalypse Now” shaped the way I look at movies. It encompassed everything I had always looked for in a film — intense dialogue, gorgeous panoramic shots, characters that imbed in the psyche, music that compliments instead of barricades, horror, humor, drama and (yes, my naïve little clerk) a touch of action.

“Apocalypse” was tattooed with an array of symbols, each interpretation as valid as the next. On the surface was the hypocrisy of the Vietnam War, and how it skewed the vision of even the most brilliant war minds. A deeper investigation shows that the boat ride main protagonist Willard (Martin Sheen) took was reminiscent of the hellish one Dante had centuries before. For the literary gurus, there is the comparison to Joseph Conrad’s nineteenth century novella, “Heart of Darkness,” which Coppola used as the basis for his movie.

Finally, there are the legends surrounding the making of the movie in the Philippines. Coppola almost destroyed himself and his entire crew with the making of “Apocalypse.” The filming took over two years and was plagued with curses reminiscent of the Tutankhamen excavation. Martin Sheen suffered a heart attack during filming, storms and uncanny mechanical failures plagued the set, drugs were used in legendary amounts, Dennis Hopper was in the midst of a coke binge during his onscreen time, and Marlon Brando proved more difficult than a 2-year-old on a sugar crash.

The madman in charge, though, was Mr. Coppola, who was steadfast in his trip to inner Hades, and he would not bend to pressures to stop the production. The end result was a film noir that could never be repeated. Although it was nominated for eight Academy Awards, the movie had a taint that Mr. Coppola and company could never shake. Mentality and reputations were forsaken in a quest for one man’s vision of pure art. Theoretically speaking, “Apocalypse Now” probably scared other directors, who may have otherwise put themselves on the line for their inner landscapes.

“By the spring of 1979, we were terrified that the film was too long, too strange and didn’t resolve itself in a kind of classic big battle at the end,” Coppola wrote in the liner notes. “We were threatened with financial disaster. I had mortgaged everything I owned to personally cover the $16 million overage. And the press kept asking, ‘Apocalypse When?’ So we shaped the film that we thought would work for the mainstream audience of its day, keeping them focused on the journey up river and making it as much a ‘war’ genre film as possible.”

Now comes “Apocalypse Now: Redux” (which I finally found a copy of in a bookstore), which comes closer to Coppola’s original intent. Forty-nine minutes have been added, as well as a facelift with computer-enhanced repairs. The end result is a glossy and elongated look at one man’s fictional and nonfictional descent into utter insanity.

Does the extra baggage make the movie better? Not at all, but the additions give a more scathing comment on the futility of Vietnam (or as the owner of the French Plantation calls it, “The Biggest Nothing in History”). If anything, the extra scenes dilute the original.

The new disturbing scene with the Playboy bunnies (who trade fuel for nooky) gives an element of hope that’s invisible in the 1979 version. The men all get lucky with these harpies, which takes away from the impending doom. I liked the original cut because there is no romantic entanglement, and it gives one the sense that pleasure got left behind on the mainland.

I did, however, like the boat stop at the French Plantation. Once they cross the line into Cambodia, Willard and company are greeted by French nobles who have guarded their plantation since before the war. One gets the feeling that these French folks are ghosts, harbingers who warn the soldiers of the evil that lurks up the river. They add fuel to the movie and have a memorable dinner table discussion about the absurdity of Vietnam. This could not have been added in 1979, when the wounds of Vietnam were still as fresh as a popped blister. The addition here gives a political slant to cinema art.

“This time we weren’t working out of anxiety, so we were able to think more about what the themes were, especially about issues related to morality in war,” wrote Coppola. “I feel any artist making a film about war by necessity will make an ‘anti-war’ film and all war films are usually that. My film is more of an ‘anti-lie’ film, in that the fact that a culture can lie about what’s really going on in warfare, that people are being brutalized, tortured, maimed and killed, and somehow present this as moral is what horrifies me, and perpetuates the possibility of war. One line in John Milius’ original script suggested this: “They teach the boys to drop fire on people, but won’t let them write the word ‘fuck’ on their airplanes.” In the words of Joseph Conrad: “I hate the stench of a lie.”

Extras aside, “Apocalypse Now: Redux” is still worth seeing. It was nice to revisit with all the characters. It felt like a homecoming for the mentally shattered. Sheen’s Willard is still the stoic soldier who has more demons than an Amityville fireplace, and Maroln Brando still breathes a foreboding evil into the genius maniac, Colonel Kurtz.

Robert Duvall’s character, Major Kilgore, is still the best minor character ever to grace the silver. Vietnam is just an intrusion for Kilgore’s search of the perfect surfing wave, and his twenty minutes of gung-ho crotch grabs, cigar chomps, and obliviousness to explosions and mayhem has never been replicated. I’ve seen “Apocalypse” over a baker’s dozen and I still get titillated when “Flight of the Valkyries” wafts over the helicopter speakers. Goose pimply stuff.

The soundtrack has not changed either. The Door’s “The End” is still placed perfectly and ensures that the viewer knows that this movie won’t end in humdrum Hollywood fashion. At the pinnacle, however, is Coppola’s breathtaking film work, which still looks as fresh as when it came out 22 years ago. That old decree, “they don’t make ‘em like they used to” is oh so true for this film noir. The only problem with seeing this movie is that comparisons will plague the brain forever. It may not be that movies are getting worse, they just can’t compete with “Apocalypse’s” precedent (you could make a case for James Cameron’s “Titanic,” but I won’t listen). Creating “Apocalypse Now” was like creating the Panama Canal. It will never be replicated, nor would anybody in their right mind try to.

Not enough action? Oh well. I guess I’m just too feeble to understand the beauty of Keanu waxing poetic and Bruce Willis pretending not to be sensitive. Give me the Golden Days when directors went loopy over their work and actors were pushed beyond their humane rights.

(Hunter Pope can be reached at w.h.pope@worldnet.att.net)

 

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