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| Apocalypse Now | 
| Director: Francis Ford Coppola
Actors: Sam Bottoms, Marlon Brando, Bo Byers, Colleen Camp, Robert Duvall
Studio: Paramount
Category: DVD
Buy New: $57.99
Buy New/Used from $8.25
Avg. Customer Rating:  (697 reviews)
Sales Rank: 11569
Format: Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dvd-video, Widescreen, Ntsc
Language: English (Original Language)
Rating: R (Restricted)
Media: DVD
Running Time: 153 minutes
Number Of Items: 1
Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.7 x 0.7
ISBN: 6305609705
UPC: 097360230642
EAN: 9786305609704
ASIN: 6305609705
Release Date: August 15, 1979
Theatrical Release Date: August 15, 1979
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.com essential video
In the tradition of such obsessively driven directors as Erich von Stroheim and Werner Herzog, Francis Ford Coppola approached the production of Apocalypse Now as if it were his own epic mission into the heart of darkness. On location in the storm-ravaged Philippines, he quite literally went mad as the project threatened to devour him in a vortex of creative despair, but from this insanity came one of the greatest films ever made. It began as a John Milius screenplay, transposing Joseph Conrad's classic story "Heart of Darkness" into the horrors of the Vietnam War, following a battle-weary Captain Willard (Martin Sheen) on a secret upriver mission to find and execute the renegade Colonel Kurtz (Marlon Brando), who has reverted to a state of murderous and mystical insanity. The journey is fraught with danger involving wartime action on epic and intimate scales. One measure of the film's awesome visceral impact is the number of sequences, images, and lines of dialogue that have literally burned themselves into our cinematic consciousness, from the Wagnerian strike of helicopter gunships on a Vietnamese village to the brutal murder of stowaways on a peasant sampan and the unflinching fearlessness of the surfing warrior Lieutenant Colonel Kilgore (Robert Duvall), who speaks lovingly of "the smell of napalm in the morning." Like Herzog's Aguirre: The Wrath of God, this film is the product of genius cast into a pit of hell and emerging, phoenix-like, in triumph. Coppola's obsession (effectively detailed in the riveting documentary Hearts of Darkness, directed by Coppola's wife, Eleanor) informs every scene and every frame, and the result is a film for the ages. --Jeff Shannon
Amazon.com
Digitally remastered with 49 minutes of previously unseen footage, Apocalypse Now Redux is the reference standard of Francis Coppola's 1979 epic. A metaphorical hallucination of the Vietnam War, the film was reconstructed by Coppola and editor Walter Murch to enrich themes and clarify the ending. On that basis Redux is a qualified success, more coherent than the original while inviting the same accusations of directorial excess. The restored "French plantation" sequence adds ghostly resonance to the war's absurdity, and Willard's theft of Colonel Kurtz's beloved surfboard adds welcomed humor to the film's nightmarish upriver journey. An encounter with Playboy Playmates seems superfluous compared to the enhanced interplay between Willard and his ill-fated boat crew, but compensation arrives in the hellish Kurtz compound, where Willard's mission--and the performances of Martin Sheen and Marlon Brando--reach even greater heights of insanity, thus validating Redux as the rightful heir to Coppola's triumphantly rampant ambition. --Jeff Shannon
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| Customer Reviews: Read 692 more reviews...
 Absolutely Amazing November 18, 2008
Definitely one of the best Vietnam war movies out there. It is more about the psychological trama of the Vienam war which I liked. It can seem a little out there from time to time but that's to get the viewer to understand it from the main character's point of view. This is definitely not for the younger kids out there and it is pretty intense. It is a must have for any DVD collection. It is one of those classic movies everyone has to see at least once. The acting is amazing. Just an overall great movie.
The Only Way To Watch It On DVD November 17, 2008
This is a very creative box cover and with the included two discs you get Apocalypse Now which looks great on the DVD, you also get Apocalypse Now Redux a 2001 version of the movie with Remastered video quality and over one hour of additional scenes added into the movie itself that were cut from the original, and many other features including interviews and watching the movie with commentaries from director as the movie plays. All in all i'd say this is a perfect product. However it must be noted that since the movie is very lengthy especially the Redux version, the movie is split with the first half on disc 1 then the second half switching to disc 2. Not a real annoyance or problem its just something you should know.
Great to see these movies again! November 11, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I was pleased with my purchase of the two-disc special collectors edition. Still great after all these years.
My new favorite. November 8, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
WOW! What an improvement. When I first saw the original, I thought:here's finally a movie for Vietnam vets. The cinematography and acting were great, but it looked like it had been edited with a hacksaw. Why is Lance water-skiing with Air CAv shorts before they run into the 1/9? And where did he get 'em? Where does he get that compact when he's putting on the camo face paint? Is that standard issue on a PBR? What's Kilgore's surfboard doing on the boat? How did it get there?Why is Clean so trigger-happy when they stop the sampan? And what happens to him after he's killed? They just throw his body overboard? That seems unlikely given the elaborate send-off Lance gives the Chief after he's wasted.
These questions and more are answered in this greatly expanded version of what's now my favorite movie. Alot has been made of how much the French Plantation Scene slows down the action. But I find it analogous to the Night Music in Stavinsky's Rite of Spring: after all the violence and discord you get a few minutes of breathing space before the insanity starts again. I speak French so maybe it's easier for me to relate to what's going
Unfortunately, not much can be done with the bizarre and incoherent last 20 minutes( the included deleted scenes at least show us what happended to the Photo-journalist and Colby and even give us the very interesting Monkey Sampan). But getting there has been maded so much more enjoyhable.
Anyway, this is a considerable improvement on an already great movie. Now, if they'd just bring it out in Blu-ray.
Quite possibly one of the most important films of all time... November 7, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The films title alone, `Apocalypse Now', is synonymous with classic; even to those who have never seen it. All the praise and admiration that has been heaped upon this film over the years has embedded in us the very idea that it must be `that' great. I personally had never seen this movie until this past holiday weekend when I was sick with the flu and in bed for three days (I watched like 30 movies, so I'm cool with it). All I have to say is that `classic' doesn't even begin to explain just how amazing this movie really is.
I want to be clear about one thing. War movies have never really been my thing. I love the whole `swords-and-sandals' epics; sure. `Ben'Hur' and `Gladiator', two of my favorite movies, but the Vietnam, guns and bullets, hiding in trenches, bombing buildings bit; never truly been that interested. My perspective on the genre changed a bit when I witnessed Stanley Kubrick's masterpiece `Full Metal Jacket', a film that is truly astonishing, but understandably very `love it or hate it'. With my interest pricked I decided to explore the genre a little more. There were some that turned me off a bit (not a huge fan of `The Thin Red Line') and there were some that really impressed me (actually floored by my adoration of Oliver Stone's `Platoon') and then there was this little ditty that just left me spellbound.
Yes, let it be said' `Apocalypse Now' may very well be the definitive `war movie'.
The film follows Captain Benjamin L. Willard, dispatched the find rogue Colonel Walter E. Kurtz who has drifted into savagery. The film basically moves along with Willard as he travels upriver towards his eventual destination. One is brought into the mentality of one ravaged by war, and the mental and emotional deterioration is overwhelming; especially once Willard comes face to face with Kurtz.
The film, to me, is shot much like a wartime film noir, with Martin Sheen narrating the film, filling in the complete story for the audience. Frances Ford Coppola is a fantastic director who savagely moves from location to location, painting a horrific picture (`the horror') that stimulates our senses and engages our minds. I remember thinking just how crisp this movie feels, its richness spilling over every sequence. The script is brilliantly crafted in a way that engages you from start to finish, never bogging us down and boring us in any way but always keeping our interest.
And then there are the performances.
Martin Sheen does a fine job here, but much like his son Charlie in `Platoon', he becomes more of an afterthought when you consider the cast of characters he shares the screen with. Robert Duvall (who was nominated for an Oscar) is extremely memorable as Lieutenant Colonel Bill Kilgore. His `napalm in the morning' phrase is probably one of the most quoted movie phrases of all time, but his one liners are not the reason his performance is so flawless. He truly captures the man that was Kilgore and emulates a human passion on the screen. Duvall is not the best performance here though; for that belongs to Marlon Brando. There are many reports about the issues Coppola had working with Brando (his excessive weight gain, his drinking problems, his apathetic attitude and his not knowing of his lines) but when all is said and done Brando pulled out a passionate and devastatingly haunting performance as the renegade Kurtz. His semi-religious almost prophetic approach to his characters revelations paint the picture that is `Apocalypse Now' and quite honestly, his character is what makes this movie so important.
This film is a very dark and treacherous journey through the mind of a man pushed to brink of his sanity due to actions that make no sense. What is so imperative about films like `Full Metal Jacket', `Platoon' and `Apocalypse Now' is that, instead of paying homage to the men in uniform (I'm not saying they don't deserve respect so don't read this wrong) they portray war as a facet of our lives better left alone, a part of our culture that does nothing but harm; physically, emotionally and mentally. Coppola's masterpiece is a film not to be missed for it relays a message that is all to real.
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