Apocalypse Now Resources

If you want to read some reviews of Apocalypse Now—positive reviews or those by crotchety dissenters—look no further. Just don't mention Metacritic… They're arch-rivals.

This is a site. With film info on it. About Apocalypse Now. How much more specific do we need to get than that? It has a synopsis and things like that.

Basically the same kind of thing as Rotten Tomatoes, its arch-rival. They're like the Montagues and Capulets. Except the Metacritic page is for the Apocalpyse Now Redux cut of the movie, for some reason.

If Apocalypse Now left you with a hankering for dark parables about imperialism, look no further. This book was the original inspiration for the movie.

If you want to take a deep dive into the making of Apocalypse Now and other dimensions of the film, here's your golden ticket to the Willy Wonka World of Apocalypse Now facts.

Dispatches is a crazy, fragmented, psychedelic classic of Vietnam War reporting. The author, Michael Herr, helped write the script for Apocalypse Now.

It's a total shame that the video of this isn't available, but here's the transcript of the genius SNL sketch where Francis Ford Coppola is the totally out-of-control rogue director whose crew worships him like a god but who's going over budget, building sets just to blow them up, and slowly losing it. Naturally, United Artists studio heads send someone into the jungle to terminate the production with extreme prejudice.

Coppola gets chatty, talking about how Brando had to use a tape recorder with an ear-piece to remember his lines and about how he (Coppola) goaded Martin Sheen into punching his own reflection in the mirror—spilling real blood all over.

This interview with Milius gets into his love of war, the way he wrote Apocalypse Now, and his beef with modern-day movies (of course, this was back in 2003). It's a treasure trove.

Writer Alex Hess effuses about his deep and abiding love for Apocalypse Now. What's with these Brits misspelling "favorite" all the time?

The late great Roger Ebert, the Dean of American Film Critics, reviews one of the all-time classics. He liked it.

This article discusses the real-life inspiration for Kurtz, why animal rights activists hated Apocalypse Now, and a bunch of other things (okay, eight other things, cause it's out of ten, right?).

The internet is all about lists, so here's another one. Except this time, it's been amped up to seventeen facts.

Robert Sellers discusses just how fraught the making of Apocalypse Now was, from a disastrously overweight Brando to the illegal use of cadavers as props on set.

The New York Times' critic, Vincent Canby, gave Apocalypse Now a decidedly mixed review. He had nice things to say about a lot of it, but hated the ending—didn't like the whole Kurtz part of the movie. Maybe he was just missing the young Brando.

Turner Classic Movies is all about classic movies. It's in the title, right? So, naturally, they must have something to say about Apocalypse Now.

There's some cool music in this trailer—The Doors and The Stones—and it hits some of the movie's big highlights without giving too much away. What more can you say for a trailer?

Sheen suffered for his art, having a heart attack on the set of the movie. So he's got to have something to say about it…

Sheen and Coppola sit down for a friendly chat. It's very friendly, in fact. Coppola knits Sheen a sweater as a present. (Okay, that doesn't actually happen. But they're clearly friends.)

Hopper talks about his hyper performance in Apocalypse Now. He's a lot more mellow here than he was in the movie.

You can tell they knew this was going to be a big line. Just look at the way they focus on Duvall as he hits the line. They knew what was up.

Coppola contemplates suicide on set, feeling like the movie's going to be terrible. He and the other actors reflect on the utterly mad experience of making the movie.

The director and screenwriter go deep into film in this interview—breaking down Apocalypse Now and the art of filmmaking.

Since it looked like Apocalypse Now was going to be a disaster, Coppola started to lose it. His wife covers this dark period in this clip from the documentary she made about the movie, Heart of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse.

The Doors were a favorite among soldiers in 'Nam, and "The End" has a particularly apocalyptic feel to it. After all, the apocalypse is the ultimate end.

There's lots of sixties classics on here—plus Wagner, who's sort of an outlier in this crowd but equally awesome.

Lots of weird electronic noises on this one. Sounds ominous. Francis Ford Coppola had an assist from his dad, Carmine, on arranging these parts of the soundtrack.

This is another father-and-son effort from Francis Ford and papa Carmine.

We wouldn't be doing our duty if we left this off the soundtrack. This is probably the most famous musical moment in the whole movie. Now, thanks to this, the average American listens to Wagner all the time.

The helicopters almost look like birds, flocking by a blood red sunset. There's also an Asian vibe to the art, indicating the movie's location in Vietnam.

This is another close-up image of some of the promotional art for the movie, featuring more helicopters superimposed over a sunset and mist.

Brando looks like a menacing titan, with the lights of war and a bloody sun around him. We can see Willard's face up by the sun, too.

This is a great visual, kind of creepy—the assassin emerging to kill.

The camera catches Hopper, somewhere in the middle of his babbling monologues.

Here's Martin Sheen with some of the Ifugao locals who played the roles of Kurtz's Montagnards. We could swear it's Emilio Estevez. Oh yeah, Emilio is Sheen's son. He kept the real family name, unlike his brother Charlie.

Sorry. Animals were harmed in the making of this movie.

Coppola directing Brando on the set.

A rare moment of R&R for our beleaguered director.