Apocalypse Now is a 1979 American epic war film set during the Vietnam War, Produced and Directed by Francis Ford Coppola and starring Marlon Brando, Martin Sheen, and Robert Duvall. The film follows the central character, U.S. Army special operations officer Captain Benjamin L. Willard (Sheen), on a mission to kill the renegade and presumed insane U.S. Army Special Forces Colonel Walter E. Kurtz (Brando). The film has been noted for the problems encountered while making it. These problems were chronicled in the documentary Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker’s Apocalypse, which recounted the stories of Brando arriving on the set overweight and completely unprepared; costly sets being destroyed by severe weather; and its lead actor (Sheen) suffering a heart attack while on location. Problems continued after production as the release was postponed several times while Coppola edited thousands of feet of footage. Upon its release, it received critical acclaim. It is now widely regarded as one of the greatest films ever. Honoured with the Palme d’Or at Cannes, and nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture and the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Drama, the film was also deemed “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant” and was selected for preservation by the National Film Registry in 2000.
