Heart of Darkness: Documentary About the FIlm Apocalypse Now

To say that the production of Apocalypse Now suffered many setbacks would be a giant understatement. After viewing the documentary on said film entitled "Heart of Darkness," it is abundantly clear that many of the difficulties the crew encountered could have been avoided. With a bit more adequate pre-production, a variety of their problems could have been curtailed.

One giant obstacle the production faced was the fact that director Francis Ford Coppola grew tired of actor Harvey Keitel's performance as Willard. Already having shot for a couple weeks, Coppola made the decision to pull Keitel thus costing the production thousands of dollars on labor and wasted film. If Coppola and crew had been more extensive in their casting search, they could have hired the right actor in the first place and saved a lot of time and money. Another way they could have avoided this disaster was conducting more table reads and cast assemblies in order to weed out improper actors and unfit performances. Early on in the production they also could have compiled a list of their second and third choices just in case a complication did in fact arise.

Another difficulty the production faced was helicopters being used in the film often left to fight battles for the Phillipine government. This caused massive delays and many headaches as the filmmakers simply had to wait until the helicopters could return to get their shots. In pre-production, Coppola and company should have looked into the option of shooting in a different location. Perhaps they could have even worked out a deal with the government that would allow them to utilize the copters no matter what the political climate of the country was at the time. Another option the crew could have explored early on in the process was trying to rent or borrow helicopters from a nearby American base.

Rewrite after rewrite caused setback after setback on the set of Apocalypse Now. Francis Ford Coppola often griped about his movie having no ending and he himself caused massive delays by altering many parts of the screenplay. In pre-production, the screenwriter John Milius and Coppola should have workshopped the script and done rewrites then. They should have committed to shooting the script they went in with only tinkering a few points here and there. Additionally, if properly planned out, rewritten scenes could have been scheduled for pick up days with only the appropriate actors and crew being present. This would have saved the film a lot on budget and time.

Yet another complication to the film's success was the harsh weather of the Phillipines during the time of filming. Treacherous storms wiped out critical sets and the crew could do nothing but stand idly by. With a more in depth scouting of locations and weather patterns, the filmmakers could have chosen the appropriate months to shoot in such an environment. They could have also considered alternate countries to shoot in that have a history of nice weather year round. Also, the filmmakers could have opted to shoot interiors and even simple exteriors in a controlled soundstage environment. The crew also should have come up with a 'plan B' in the pre-production phase that would allow them to shoot different shots in case a storm did in fact rip through the area.

Apocalypse Now faced a plethora of problems that could have easily been avoided had their pre-production been more extensive. Despite having gone through so many turbulent times, the filmmakers found a way to put together a great movie that will stand the test of time. As with any movie, pre-production is vital and could have saved this production in many of its dire circumstances. To this day, it is one of the few productions out of the Hollywood system that has suffered so many complications and yet still churned out a respectable piece of cinema.