Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse
(Parmount Region 1 NTSC DVD)
(1991)
review by Head Cheeze

It took me a little while to “get” Francis Ford Coppola’s “Apocalypse Now”. I first saw the film when I was thirteen years old, hoping for the sort of rousing, jingoistic war movie I’d grown up on (even the anti-war sentiment of “The Big Red One” was lost on me), but was alarmed to discover a film that depicted our soldiers as scared, inexperienced, impressionable, and violent individuals; in other words, an average young American male. I was also completely unaware of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, the book upon which Coppola’s dark odyssey is based, so Willard’s journey to the Kurtz compound both confounded and…yes…bored me. I revisited the film a few years later, slightly older, slightly wiser, and, this time armed with an intimate knowledge of the source material, and I was, obviously, won over by the movie’s genius. It’s since become a favorite of mine that I revisit at least once a year, and have eagerly devoured any and all supplemental material devoted to it, save for one film; the “holy grail” of my Apocalypse Now fixation, “Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker’s Apocalypse”.

Made up of recordings, diary entries, and documentary footage shot on the set by Coppola’s wife, Eleanor, and edited together with interviews conducted over a decade later, Hearts of Darkness chronicles the making of Apocalypse Now with unprecedented access to all of the film’s highs and lows. From the monsoons and Martin Sheen’s heart attack (both of which threatened to shut down the production), to Coppola’s own descent into a sort of creative depression, this 1991 documentary is the rare example of a “making-of” that is equally as compelling as the movie, itself. While I’ve heard Coppola talk about Apocalypse Now, and have read his thoughts on the production, Eleanor Coppola’s recordings (which she took without her husband’s knowledge) and her grainy set footage reveal an entirely different side of the making of the movie, highlighting the almost mystical process behind its creation, and offering a “warts and all” look into the mind of one of America’s greatest filmmakers. These raw materials, alone, may not have amounted to anything, however, had co-director’s Fax Bahr and George Hickenlooper not expertly culled and cobbled them together with the “new” interview footage and narration. These interviews make for a fascinating dichotomy between the frighteningly primal atmosphere of the Philippines production and the relative safety of “home”, with each interviewee reflecting on their experiences with the sort of intensity one would expect from veterans of the war itself.

Hearts of Darkness finally makes its DVD debut courtesy of Paramount, with a commentary by Coppola, as well as an all-new documentary entitled “Coda: Thirty Years Later” which sees Eleanor once again filming her husband as he makes his return to cinema after a nearly decade-long absence. Coda focuses on the making of “Youth Without Youth”, a seemingly whimsical period time-travel/mystery/love story. I found it a bit of an odd choice for a supplement to Hearts of Darkness - what, a nearly feature-length documentary about an entirely different film I’ve not even seen yet - but I did find Coda to be a wonderfully charming and deeply personal love letter from Eleanor to Francis, and its inclusion here sees her journey as her husband’s chronicler come full circle.

Hearts of Darkness is absolutely essential viewing for both Apocalypse Now fans and those interested in film in general. Nowhere else will you see such an unflinching (and, often, unflattering) account of the making of a major motion picture; the fact that it’s subject is one of the most profound and celebrated motion pictures of all times, well, that’s just gravy.