Analysis of Apocalypse Now

When I viewed Apocalypse Now for first time I was highly confused as you can read in my earlier blog, but after viewing certain scenes for the second time I definitely had a different reaction. I felt that after we had our second class on the movie and we really discussed some of the different things about the movie that we though were interesting and compelling I really started to look more deeply into the scenes that I was re-watching. I had a different view of the movie the second time around, and although there are still some parts that confuse me, I really feel that the movie does a great job at going deep into the minds of the soldiers that really loose themselves in war, and that is something that I do not think that we get to witness very often unless we ourselves have experienced it.

While viewing some of the scenes a second time around I really noticed the use of color throughout the entire film. In the opening scene it is relatively dim and you cannot really see a whole lot besides that fading in and out of Willard's face and a helicopter in the sky. But the colors after this scene were all very similar throughout the rest of the movie. Specifically in many of the action scenes, and other scenes in between the action scenes, there is a constant use of the same colors. The colors that we witness the most are reds, oranges, yellows, and a few darker colors such as black and army green. From the opening scene to the closing scene we see blood which is red as we all know, and in pretty much every scene leading up to the closing scene there is some variation of either the use of the color red or blood. Another color that is very symbolic throughout the entire movie is orange which represents fire in the movie, and that too is in a numerous amount of the scenes in the movie. From the shores of the beach with Kilgore, to the riversides we see while Willard and the crew on the boat are heading up to the the Doo Long Bridge to get up to Kurtz's camp we see fire and explosions that are killing masses of people that we never really meet or even see. The color of blood and fire are obvious throughout the entire movie, but there is also the color yellow that we see constantly. But yellow is not just used to symbolize fire, it is also used along the shores of the river, as the color for the buildings and homes that we see along the shores and in battle, we also see it a lot when we get to Kurtz's camp for the first time because on the shore is numerous amounts of rock and dirt that is a yellowish color. Not only is yellow used a lot with the scenery and the buildings but it is used for shading as well. Because many of the frames are relatively dark the color of the lighting that we see on their faces is yellow, almost like a candle light which is fire, so yellow also stands for fire at times in the movie as well. We see this yellow lighting throughout the whole movie, but it becomes brighter and brighter towards the end of the movie, especially at Kurtz's camp.

We do not have to the privilege of seeing Kurtz right away and it was very frustrating for me at first, and we just see parts of his head and body in the beginning, and then slowly he moves his face into the yellowish light and he is revealed. His face is not as scary as I think they wanted it to be, or at least not as scary now as it may have been back when it was first released. But even though it was not scary it was memorable. I think that you could really see the sadness in his face and that made me feel bad for him after I saw him for the first time. Not only do I see sadness on his face because of this perfect use of color, but I also see sickness. When we see people that are sick, their skin tones are not usually normal and they often look a little yellowish and pale, and when I see this part of the movie I really think that the yellow color not only represents the sadness that he feels for everything he has done and for his family, but also how mentally and possibly physically sick he is. This yellow is the perfect color because of its soft and pale tone, and I think that the use of color cinematography in this scene is probably the most compelling throughout the whole movie.

I really felt that at the end of the movie after watching it the first time and even after viewing parts of it the second time that the most memorable part for me was when we met Kurtz for the first time. When I think about the movie now the image you see above is the picture I see in my head every time, and I really think that it made such an impact on me because of the use of color in this movie.