Rating: 
Summary: Great Movie
Review: There are plenty of good reviews if you need them. This is truly a wonderful movie. Rent/Buy it and see for youself (the original that is, not redux).
Rating: 
Summary: This is really a 2 star movie.
Review: To understand the liberals view of the world after the Vietnam war and watergate one could say start by watching this movie all the way through. There is not reality about the Veitnam War, only politically motivated perceptions bend to fit a mind set.This movie is to well made to be a 1 star movie. The cinematography here is truly spectacular.
Rating:
Summary: My Favorite Ever
Review: Simply a masterpiece and Francis Ford Coppola's best film in my opinion.There are so many ways to view this and take something new everytime.The use of surrealism is especially strong near the end of it.This is not much a war movie however,like Full Metal Jacket but an experience of war attained.Watch with an open mind.
Rating: 
Summary: Weird, but good
Review: The film has a very dark atmosphere throughout it. The only flaw is that there were many un-necessary scenes and the movie could have been much better without them. There was only one major battle, and that was near the beginning of the movie. The action in the battle was fantastic. But where's the rest of the action? Some parts in the movie were really boring, I kept waiting for something to happen, and it eventually did. In my opinion, this is just an average, or slighty above average War movie. Score - B
Rating:
Summary: Original versus Redux
Review: I'm a hardcore Apocalypse Now fanatic, and this, the original version of the film, is what made me one, several years ago. Reviewers like to debate endlessly over which version is better, this or the Redux. Personally, I like both, but I find this original version to be more surreal, relentless, and, to quote another reviewer, more "dangerous." The fact is, Coppola used different shots and edits in the Redux, in some cases diluting the surreal impact of the original. Plus the characters Kilgore and Kurtz come off more strongly in the original; sure, we get to see more humanity from Kilgore in the Redux, but his exit in the original is much more memorable, much better than the "tossing megaphone into the air" antics as shown in the Redux. And Kurtz is a more powerful Evil One in the original version, not much more than a shadow. What gets me is that, in the press releases that came out with Redux, Coppola claimed that he no longer considered the 1979 version of Apocalypse to be "unusual." He felt that, today, it comes off as a rather ordinary film. So he integrated an extra 50 minutes into the movie, to make it more unusual. The thing is, the Redux is, if anything, MORE normal than the original. After all, you get more character development, a romantic subplot, etc; all the things the unusual (and unique), original version lacked. The very lack of these things is what gives the original such a mysterious, dangerous edge. There is no levity in the original, no stealing of surfboards, no Playmates for the PBR crew. Only the dark jungle, and the mission. If it's true that Coppola wanted to make the original version even more unusual, then I wonder why he chose to add the Plantation sequence and the Playboy Bunnies escapade. Having seen the Work Print, I know that there is a wealth of material Coppola could've used. Bizarre? Unusual? How about a scene in which Martin Sheen's Willard, trapped in a bamboo cage, writhes in pain as the montangnards (and Kurtz's American soldiers) dance and chant around him, as they sacrifice a pig? Or how about Willard, still in the cage, being questioned by Kurtz, who tells Willard that he's as weak as his "colleagues in Washington?" Or how about possibly the most bizarre scene of all: Dennis Hopper's Photojournalist being shotgunned to death by Scott Glenn's character Colby? Coppola could have used any or all of these scenes to make a truly "unusual" film, one that would successfully create a darker film. If anything, the extra scenes in Redux lighten the film's mood. Coppola could have even improved on the end of the movie. That's one thing that's always bothered me about Apocalypse Now. Willard's hired to murder Kurtz; when he finally does, all he has to do is just walk into Kurtz's temple, take out one guard, and then get to hacking at Kurtz. It comes off as so easy, you wonder why the Army even bothered hiring Willard. This problem is solved in the Work Print, which features Willard taking on a host of guards, including one grisly scene in which he spears an American guard who cowers behind a young, Vietnamese boy. Now, if you ask me, that's more "unusual" than a bunch of French people arguing politics at the dinner table! But unfortunately, Coppola has chosen not to use these scenes, in either official version of the film. I don't intend to mislead, though. I think the Redux is fine, a five-star movie. It expands on the broader themes of Apocalypse Now, but at the same time lessens the impact of the movie itself. After having watched the Redux a few times, I popped the original in for the first time in a few years. I was amazed at how the film seemed so different than the Redux, so much more psychedelic and surreal. Even the fades and images shown in the beginning and the end are different in the original, more disturbing. And that's the main difference between the two versions: the original is much more disturbing. I'll finish with another quote, taken from the web. Which director do you think is better, the Francis Coppola of 1976/1979, or the Francis Coppola of 2001? Of these two very different directors, whose vision would you be more willing to trust?
Rating:
Summary: Masterpiece Theater!
Review: Without a doubt, not only a great piece of filmmaking, but a seminal piece of art as well. Few films will last the march of time, but this one surely will. It says something that is irrespective of time, place and person. Those looking for a strict 'Vietnam' genre film would be best to pick up Platoon, another great film, but completely different. Apocalypse Now is indeed the archetypal war film. Of all war. It is a journey into the 'heart of darkness' that lies within all of us. Martin Sheen does a grand job in taking us down his 'river of darkness, ' as Special Forces Captain Willard. Unable to adjust to life back home(not shown of course, but hinted at) Willard is unable to kill the beast the war has created within him. And then he gets his chance. Special assignment. 'Terminate with extreme prejudice' one Colonel Kurtz... Willard's journey up the river into Cambodia mirrors his own spiritual journey to exorcise the dark creature that the war has created in him. Each river stop brings him closer to Kurtz. And thus closer to self-revelation and purification. Coppola supremely crafted each scene along the river. Each with its own ironic message. ... Then, ... Coppola makes some none too subtle references between the connection of the sexual drive and the urge to kill.....again another step down the road to oblivion.....which is finally climaxed at Kurtz's compound ... This is the final stop of war and of the degradation it breeds in those who fight and revel in it. Coppola makes a compelling statement that war can't be fought sanely nor with rules. One eventually becomes a Kurtz or a Willard. Two sides of an equally damned coin. Enough has already been said about the great soundtrack, stunning cinematography and stellar performances all around the board(even the cameo appearances like Ford's and Hopper's are well done), but the real gold mine is the script itself. Every line of dialogue has to be listened to. Spartan and terse, it approaches the aphoristic in many places, like with Willard's internal monologue. ... In summary, Apocalypse Now is an experience that all film lovers should undergo. It enriches you with every viewing.
Rating:
Summary: Haunted Vision
Review: Let me start by stating that I don't often view films over and over. I am basically a story person, who enjoys plots and who does not go over technical aspects. Usually after a couple of viewings, the plot loses impact and I can go several years before taking in a "rerun". Francis Ford Coppola's APOCALYPSE NOW is one of the few exceptions for me. A powerful take on Conrad's Heart of Darkness, this is less a war movie, than a simulation of a nightmare. Juxtaposed against the backdrop of the Viet Nam war, this film offers carrer defining performances from several actors, including Martin Sheen, Robert Duvall, Marlon Brando and Dennis Hopper. I have taken this in approximatley 30 times and it still has the same impact in each recurring viewing that I had when I saw this in the theatre in 1979. In my opinion, one of the all time greats.
Rating: 
Summary: Horrible and Absurd!
Review: This movie has nothing to do with the American war in Vietnam. It is an adaption of Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness". The problem is that uninformed viewers will take this nonsense as being some close reflection of reality and will be led by the misconception to the othodox view that the American experience in Vietnam was a result of an American military gone crazy in a culture it didn't understand. Nothing could be further from the truth. But this is the view that the wealthy and privileged would like for generations of Americans to embrace. For anyone who served in the special forces, the portrayal of the Captain and the Colonel by Sheen and Brando respectively is so completely absurd as to be offensive. Shame on the directors and producers for presenting this nonsense as anything more than what it really is, drug addled revisionism.
Rating:
Summary: what a waste
Review: I understand why people consider "Apocalypse Now" a great film. I really do. From a cinematic perspective, it's a powerful, even riveting piece of work. But from my perspective (that of a child to a Vietnam vet, of a reader who loved "Heart of Darkness", of a student in a class studying literature of the Vietnam War), I think it's a decadent piece of [junk.] The first (endless!) shot was amazing - trees blowing in the wind generated by landing helicopters, the Doors' "The End" playing to haunting effect. From there, it descended into a piece of self-indulgent [junk] in the mode of an auteur on an LSD trip. Those dramatic shots of Brando in darkness, dramatically raising his face to the light! Sheen dramatically emerging out of the river, face blackened! Sheen parading dramatically down the fire-lit corridor! The truly decadent and hideously smug scene in which Kurtz and the bull are simultaneously (and, of course, dramatically) slaughtered. I could picture Coppola just out of camera range - "Wow, aren't I cool! This is so...dramatic!" An art film that mocks its subjects, annihilates a literary classic, and turns the Vietnam War experience into a circus freak show. I'll respect the right of others to disagree and to perhaps think I'm crazy, but there's my two cents and I'm sticking by it.
Rating:
Summary: Crawling Across That Razored Edge
Review: "I watched a snail crawl across the edge of a straightrazor. Its my dream, its my nightmare. Crawling, slithering across the edge of straightrazor and surviving." That's the voice of a man called Kurtz, an enigmatic officer that's gone "native" in the depths of Combodia. Your mission objective is simple enough, go up the river, locate Kurtz, and terminate with extreme prejudice. Unfortunately, many things are remiss in the oversimplified statement, "Go up the river and kill Kurtz." Just ask Captain Willard, who's been wanting to submerge himself within the depths of warfare once more and has now been given this onset of a message, intercepted from the prize, Wiliam Kurtz. His mission is simple enough, going up the river and finding his prey of a man, or at least that's how it seems. In the beating heart of the firestorm called Vietnam, nothing is easy, though, and Willard, submerged beneath the veins of madness and brutality as he seeks that elusive objective, begins to understand that more and more in the process. The strange thing about Apocalypse Now, set in the tinderbox of Vietnam, is that it isn't focused upon the sole event of the man forging through the jungle to go and capture the renegade named Kurtz. Instead, borrowing from its predecessor "The Heart of Darkness" - to which the film makes it clear that it pays a great deal of homage, it is about the madness of the events set into motion engulfing this one small figure and the futility of many of the actions/interactions located along the way. As Willard tells you in the beginning of the film, this is his confession on the matter, letting you know that he, too, is a guilty party in the chaotic affair that gnaws hungrily at the souls of all involved. Therefore, in a sense, he is also a party to the insanity taking root all over the feature. I found this to be an interesting affair, not only in the conceptual depiction of the insanity feeding upon the soldiers that we find ourselves focused upon, but in the questions the movie poses as it presses onward, showcasing more and more of the perversities by the same forces that label a man like Kurtz mad and yet birth asylums in their own ranks. The stellar casting accents this further, letting forces like a young Larry Fishburne and an equally young Harrison Ford play side by side with the Sheens and Brandos as they showcase a diversity of talents. All to destroy an enigmatically tormented soul. Even if you've seen the movie before, the DVD is a pristine example of restorative technology can do for movies that deserve preferential treatment. This example is one of the best I've seen, showing its viewers the wonders involved in the art of making a very dramatic example of what warring encompasses. It also has some interesting extras, including the comparisons to Conrad's "Heart of Darkness," letting someone that hasn't been inducted into the work taste some of the symbology buried within those pages. For these reasons and because of other, more addictive loves that encompass the "smells of napalm in the morning," the abnormality of the color spectrum when one chemically bends it in the middle of a battle, and because of the sheer scope of the cinematic equation, I'd have to issue directives for everyone to buy.
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