Apocalypse: Now

Lt Kilgore: I love the smell of napalm in the morning. (Apocalypse Now)

After watching Apocalypse Now Redux (the Redux one is longer), there is no helping but sensing the US's self righteousness, arrogance and ignorance.



Apocalypse Now is a movie set in the Vietnam war where the main character has to go kill a AWOL (away with out leave, deserter etc.) soldier (Kurtz) who is in charge of a bunch of soldiers doing "unsound" things to fight. At one point the main character has to go by helicopter ride to drop their boat (just run with it, too hard to explain... more I'm just lazy). Just before they attack, Lt Kilgore says to play a piece of music which turns out to be "Ride of the Valkyries". (Check the video above) Once you listen to it you'll agree that it sounds very self righteous, like they are flying in with helicopters to free the land from the oppressing Viet Cong. "Ride of the Valkyries" is also referenced in various other US Army/Marine movie stuffs because of this film. Seriously, what kinda idiot would play music to scare the people they attack? That's plain stupid. Which leads to my next point.

Making loud noises just attracts attention, which is pointless in a SUPRISE ATTACK. Not only does Lt Kilgore play music, but he actually ordered the attack on the village based on the fact that "Charlie don't surf." (The sharp guys here will notice that this is the name of the first mission of CoD4 for the US. To me this presses this point or the point before.) Charlie being the bad guys. The statement is exactly as it sounds. His rationale for attacking a enemy stronghold is because they don't surf the beach they occupy. Although the attack went relatively well, before it is secured properly the CO (commanding officer = Kilgore in this case) orders, yes ORDERS, some of his men to go surf the waves. So the 2 guys go surfing while once in a while mortars drop around them (lucky they didn't die). Kilgore was about to go surfing as well (he put shorts on, and the fighting still hadn't finished) only to be stopped by the waves being crap. Which sorta leads to my next point.

Trying to surf may be one of the dumbest things they try to do in the middle of a fight, but some other interesting points include how the Americans try to fight. USO (United Service Organisations) are various ways to provide morale to the troops that are deployed. The one seen in Apocalpse Now feature 3 Playboy Playmates wearing little and dancing provocatively to which some of the soldiers start going into a bit of a frenzy. The main character reads a document written by Kurtz which constrasts the idea of having USO shows and how the enemy fights. While the Viet Cong have no such thing as USO to "boost morale", they fight better because they are focused and are disciplined. The US meanwhile have lots of troops running crazy, stupid, undisciplined, afraid and unfocused (this is shown A LOT during the movie). The Americans seem more focused on fighting with the illusion of trying to preserve "normal" living standards for their soldiers rather trying to win. More idiotic behaviour include stories of someone killing their CO because they ruined a foldout of their favourite Playboy Playmate, a soldier using acid (and yes getting high) in the middle of enemy territory and the same soldier more worried about a puppy than what's happening around them.

Let's hope the it isn't like that now...