Apocalypse Now/ Heart of Darkness
Helicopters
On page 79 of Joseph Conrad’s of Heart of Darkness , he writes about going through the snake like river and coming along a man-of-war just shooting into the brush. The helicopter scene in Apocalypse Now is the equivalent of this scene in Heart of Darkness. In both cases they are trying to scare away the natives. When the man-of-war is shooting into the wilderness it is trying to scare away the people, and as the helicopters approach the beach they blair music to scare away the natives, followed by them shooting aimlessly into the village. The director of this film is successful in trying to portray this part of the novel. He successfully portrays the chaotic nature if this. The music and the aimless shooting is by far the best way to show this chaos, it visually makes the person feel how cray the whole situation is, just as Conrad does in his novel with the aimless shooting of the man-of-war shooting into the jungle. One is just as chaotic as the other. The director of this film knew exactly what he was going for, and captured it in this great visual of chaos. The chaos of the whole situation is even further shown in the film when it shoots the later scene on the beach where some of the soldiers are surfing in-between bombs landing in the water. Overall the film maker’s objective is met in this helicopter scene.
Bunkers
The bunker scene of Apocalypse now can be paralleled to the part of Heart of Darkness in which Marlow gets to the first station, the bunker is the first station. In Apocalypse Now the director made apart of the scene in which it shows flashing lights, and every time the light flashes the viewer can see a couple of men sitting in the corner of the bunker. The looks on the faces of these men looks blank and dismal as if they are sitting their preparing to die. This can be tied very closely to a specific scene in Heart of Darkness, as Conrad wrote ” Black shapes crouched, lay, sat between the trees leaning against the trunks, clinging to the earth, half coming out, half effaced with the dim light, in all the attitudes of pain, abandonment and despair.” The movies fits this part of the book perfectly it shows the soldiers as black shapes who sometimes come out when a bomb explodes and they are lit up, and is further showed by the look on the soldiers faces. They look to be in despair, and look almost abandoned. The feeling of abandonment is furthered by there not being a commanding officer around and the people’s reactions to that information. The visual of this is extremely effective. Right away when I saw this scene I knew what it was and every feeling i got when reading Heart of Darkness, I got while watching Apocalypse Now.
Kurtz
The whole scene in Apocalypse Now when Kurtz is first seen is kind of off from the novel Heart of Darkness. The scene shows the actor sitting down the entire time, while the novel talks of him standing up and walking around. The movie is however on by the way in which he is lighted in the movie. It shows him in the dark where the narrarator cannot see him, and when his face is shown, he looks like a very big and he speaks very well. These aspects of the movie work well enough to convey in the movie what Conrad did in his book. Kurtz is showed as a man if power in both pieces which conveys a feeling of a safe insecurity. The director, while being slightly off in his portayal of the scene is able to bring forth the feeling of a safe insecurity the Conrad does in his novel. The way in which Kurtz scene is shot is kind of erie with the lighting of only his face and this is why is was successful.
