In the movie, Apocalypse Now, based on the Vietnam War, the director portrays the reality of war, a very traumatic place, and leads viewers through the painful reality that left many warriors with everlasting nightmares and disturbing memories. As is most great war-related films, the overarching message is pointed towards viewer understanding of the Vietnam War. The director did this by exemplifying the positives and negatives of the war, so that all viewers can learn from these historical events and prevent similar wars in the future. The director uses many literary elements in Apocalypse Now such as setting, characterization, and theme to further the understanding of the message.
Apocalypse Now was released on August 15, 1979, portraying
…show more content…
Willard and Colonel Walter E. Kurtz are considered main characters. Captain Willard’s mission is to kill Colonel Kurtz, who is running rampant along towns in Cambodia. Captain Willard is best described in military terms as a “salty war-hero”, meaning that he has tremendous experience in war. Captain Willard is initially presented going through a traumatic panic attack where flashbacks from his previous deployments come to haunt him. Personally, Captain Willard’s best quote was spoken during this time in Saigon, “When I was here, I wanted to be there; when I was there, all I could think of was getting back into the jungle” (Coppola). This quote reigns for many War Veterans to this day. War is horrific, but an individual who has been there likely misses something about it. Throughout most of the film, Captain Willard portrays a quiet, in the shadows demeanor; however, observant and lethal. He eventually completes his mission when he killed Colonel Kurtz near the end of the film. Colonel Kurtz is comparable to a modern-day cowboy, who lives by his own rules. Although he is seen as savage in his duties, most of his soldiers respect him for being genuine. Colonel Kurtz appeared to be an exceptional leader for his men with a tremendous ability to boost his soldier’s morale and motivation. Despite these positive qualities, Colonel Kurtz has the wrong priorities, which led him to be targeted for death. Although the two main characters surround the storyline, each lower-ranked soldier had their own unique characteristics. These soldiers help the audience feel as if they’re experiencing the war themselves alongside this large group of
Mark Atwood Lawrence’s The Vietnam War: A Concise International History shows readers an international affair involving many nations and how the conflict progressed throughout its rather large existence. Lawrence starts his book in a time before America was involved in the war. It starts out with the French trying to colonize the nation of Vietnam. Soon the United States gets involved and struggles to get its point across in the jungles of Indo-China. Much of the book focuses on the American participation in helping South Vietnam vie for freedom to combine the country as a whole not under Communist rule. Without seeing many results, the war drug on for quite some time with neither side giving up. This resulted in problems in Vietnam and the U.S.
	The novel illuminates light on the situation not just during the Vietnam era, but also rather throughout all history and the future to come. Throughout mankind’s occupation of earth, we have been plagued by war and the sufferings caused by it. Nearly every generation of people to walk this earth have experienced a great war once in their lifetimes. For instance, Vietnam for my father’s generation, World War 2 for my grandfather’s, and World War 1 for my great-grandfather’s. War has become an unavoidable factor of life. Looking through history and toward the future, I grow concerned over the war that will plague my generation, for it might be the last war.
Even though the films “Battleship Potemkin”, “From Here to Eternity” and “Saving Private Ryan” are all movies based on military life during war time the variation in time periods and culture made each film very different. These differences did not take away from the impact the films had on their audiences at the time or the messages they were each trying to covey. The Horrific images and hear wrenching scenarios helped to evoke strong emotions and patriotic feeling from audiences allowing film makers to pass along their truths. Thru these films we are magically transported to several dark periods in the world history and left to experience the pain, fear, isolation and ultimately the triumph of these soldiers’ lives.
Robert S. McNamara's book, In Retrospect, tells the story of one man's journey throughout the trials and tribulations of what seems to be the United States utmost fatality; the Vietnam War. McNamara's personal encounters gives an inside perspective never before heard of, and exposes the truth behind the administration.
Fifty-eight thousand were killed, a pair of thousand captured, and three hundred fifty thousand; maimed and wounded, just about everyone throughout this country still feels the results of this conflict. Today, the kids in the country rest uneasy in response to the senselessness of this struggle. A different generation of school students, staff and young parents bring a singular perspective to the analysis of the implications of this specific war. These square measure the sons and daughters of the boys that fought to their death inside the jungles of South East Asia..
Apocalypse Now is a very vivid and sometimes disturbing film centered on the Vietnam War. Because it was based on Joseph Conrad's novella Heart of Darkness, it is possible to draw some parallels between the two. Both can be interpreted as metaphors for a journey through the inner self, and each has its own singular message to convey. Apocalypse Now very perspicuously depicts the fact that men have hearts of darkness, and it explores the evils of war. At the same time, however, it seemingly glorifies some aspects. The anti-war sequences were often brutal and portrayed destruction as a result of the human condition. The film Apocalypse Now, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, can be interpreted both as pro-war and anti-war in its intent, although the latter is a more valid interpretation.
Capturing the Reality of the Vietnam War in The Deer Hunter and Apocalypse Now ‘The Deer Hunter’ and ‘Apocalypse Now’ are two films which deal, at a very personal level, with American involvement in the Vietnam War. Although the style and narrative of each film are quite different a strong theme of ‘journeys’ is what binds the two films together, perhaps more so than the theme of the Vietnam War itself. These are journeys of self-discovery and self-destruction and in the sense that the central characters’ ideals become twisted by war and their value of life itself diminished. It is possible to claim that these films provide ‘salves for a wounded nation’.
The Vietnam War (1954-1975) was, and continues to be, a contentious issue around the world. Many analysts of the war attribute it to Lyndon B. Johnson, who was president of America from 1963 until 1969, because under his administration, the American Army became involved in combat in Vietnam. Although there were many facets that lead Johnson to make his decision and there were three other presidents, in power during the course of America’s involvement in Vietnam, who also played key roles, it was Johnson who made the decision to escalate US intervention in Vietnam.
The Vietnam war brought about multiple uses for the military police. These men had a wide spectrum of jobs, which could range from fighting in the front line all the way to traffic control. They also fought in many battles, raided towns, guarded important cargo and areas, training dogs, digging out tunnel rats, and catching Vietcong members.
War is cruel. The Vietnam War, which lasted for 21 years from 1954 to 1975, was a horrific and tragic event in human history. The Second World War was as frightening and tragic even though it lasted for only 6 years from 1939 to 1945 comparing with the longer-lasting war in Vietnam. During both wars, thousands of millions of soldiers and civilians had been killed. Especially during the Second World War, numerous innocent people were sent into concentration camps, or some places as internment camps for no specific reasons told. Some of these people came out sound after the war, but others were never heard of again. After both wars, people that were alive experienced not only the physical damages, but also the psychic trauma by seeing the deaths and injuries of family members, friends or even just strangers. In the short story “A Marker on the Side of the Boat” by Bao Ninh about the Vietnam War, and the documentary film Barbed Wire and Mandolins directed by Nicola Zavaglia with a background of the Second World War, they both explore and convey the trauma of war. However, the short story “A Marker on the Side of the Boat” is more effective in conveying the trauma of war than the film Barbed Wire and Mandolins because of its well-developed plot with well-illustrated details, and its ability to raise emotional responses from its readers.
The aim of this work is a comparison between the novel "Heart of Darkness" and "Apocalypse Now," Francis F. Coppola film loosely adapted from the novel by Conrad. “Apocalypse Now” was performed as film based on the text of Conrad and placing it in the context of the Vietnam War. Although several elements were added, such as characters and situations that are not in the text, the film reflects in many ways “Heart of Darkness” in the history and development. Adapting the work of Conrad, many abstract things that are not in the text, jump to the screen. In other words, text transformation into visual representation vision adds a vision of evil in men, the fear of death, nostalgia for the home, etc. The film has
Contending versions of the Vietnam War and the antiwar movement began to develop even before the war ended. The hawks' version, then and now, holds that the war was winnable, but the press, micromanaging civilian game theorists in the Pentagon, and antiwar hippies lost it. . . . The doves' version, contrarily, remains that the war was unwise and unwinnable no matter what strategy was employed or how much firepower was used. . . Both of these versions of the war and the antiwar movement as they have come down to us are better termed myths than versions of history because they function less as explanations of reality than as new justifications of old positions and the emotional investments that attended them (Garfinkle, 7).
In Kurtz' camp, a site of primitive evil, they are greeted by a crazed, hyperactive, fast-talking, spaced-out free lance photo-journalist played by Dennis Hoper. The babbling combat photographer, garlanded by his camera equipment, hopes for their sake, that they haven't come to take away Colonel Kurtz. He describes the great awe all the natives have for their jungle lord: "Out here, we're all his children." The photojournalist appears to be a fanatical follower of Kurtz, worshipping the enigmatic, genius "poet-warrior" Kurtz as a personal god and expounding Kurtz's cause: "You don't talk to the Colonel, you listen to him. The man's enlarged my mind. He's a poet-warrior in the classic sense...I'm a little man. He's a great man. I should have been a pair of ragged claws, scuttling across floors of silent seas, I mean...He can be terrible. He can be mean. And he can be right. He's fighting a war. He's a great man." He offers first-hand advice from his own experience: "Play it cool, laid back...You don't judge the Colonel." Willard is impressed by Kurtz's power over the people.
Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now portrays the brutality of the Vietnam War and American’s perspective from therein. Coppola successfully produced this film parallel to Joseph Conrad’s 1899 novella, Heart of Darkness. Both portray the effects of imperialism on a native land with respect to the imperialists’ viewpoint. The scene of Apocalypse Now that mirrored Heart of Darkness with the most creative license, on the behalf of Coppola, is perhaps the final scene as Kurtz is slaughtered. Each creator successfully utilized the arts of their crafts to create a final production worthy of admiration while clearly stating their interpretation of imperialism.
As we got further and further into the Vietnam War, few lives were untouched by grief, anger and fear. The Vietnamese suffered the worst hardship; children lay dead in the street, villages remained nothing but charred ashes, and bombs destroyed thousands of innocent civilians. Soldiers were scarred emotionally as well as physically, as