Since I leaning towards doing my final paper of Conrad's Heart of Darkness and Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse now, I figured I'd do a bit of long awaited research into the making of the latter. I found in the library a 1991 documentary film comprised of homemade footage from the time Coppola and his wife spent in Vietnam making the film. Let me tell you, if HoD and Apocalypse Now are both stories about men going made and confronting their own demons in the darkness, then this story fits right in with that little genre of story telling. The filming process, as it turns out, was hell. It took almost three years of filming to get a properly finished cut, the one that made it to theaters. And during those three years, Coppola was at odds with everyone, screenwriters, actors, the film studios, all because the constant changes in story and direction nearly sent, or rather did send, Coppola over the edge. An interesting sidestory is the filming of the openign sequence, where Martin Sheen as Willard dances crazily around his room, toiling in anguish. This sequence was filmed while Sheen was still a heavy drinker and smoker, all of his reactions in the scene, even the unexpected breaking of the mirror, are all genuinely real and not scripted. A perfect example of confronting ones own demons. And that's just the beginning of the many side stories that plauged the films production. So many, I can't put them all in this one blog. You just have to check it out for yourself.
The name of the film is "Heart of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse" and it is on our VHS rack in Lily Library. I highly recommend it for anyone who loves the film and wants to know just how hectic is was to get made. No disappointments here.
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