Heart Of Darkness And Apocalypse Now
Heart of Darkness and Apocalypse Now:
The Development of “The Horror”
In the beginning of Francis Ford Coppolas Apocalypse Now, the haunting voice of The Doors Jim Morrison painfully croons, “Lost in a wilderness of pain, all the children are insane.” These lyrics are coupled with scenes of tumultuous chaos and discordant images of dissolving memories. The scene finally focuses onto the face of a man, and it is realized that these memories are his own. The music and cinematography was utilized here to initiate the viewer into an elucidation of personal turmoil within him. This man is Captain Benjamin Willard, an assassin for the Armys Special Forces, who struggles interminably with the “abomination” of the Vietnam War.
Shortly later, Willard begins a journey of immense scope up the Nung River, through the heart of Vietnam, into Cambodia. He is to find, and exterminate, one Colonel Kurtz. As the mission begins, so too does a parallel, a bridge between two rivers: the Nung and the Congo. And with this same bridge, so begins the tale of Charles Marlow and Heart of Darkness. “The Horror” in both Heart of Darkness and Apocalypse Now develops
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