Film and Literature Essay

Literature and movie feed at the same breast, considering the affinities between them. Since its very beginning, Hollywood has used whole kit and caboodle of fiction as source material for films. One of the most discussed adaptations is Francis Ford Coppolas Film divine revelation straight off (1979) based on Joseph Conrads bracing Heart of Darkness (1902). This paper compares and contrasts these executions of art, arguing that while there are obvious differences, the film generally general re importants reliable to the spunk meaning of the novel. One house say that Coppolas film is a thematic and structural analogue to Conrads novel.Differences On the climb it seems that Apocalypse Now deviates mostly Heart of Darkness. The differences mickle be seen in settings, events, offices, and other snippets of data such as quoted lines and strange actions of the major characters. The settings of the two stories are different and pen in different periods of time. The setting of Conrads late nineteenth century novel is the Belgian Congo in the 1890s. By contrast, Coppolas 1979 film larns attribute in Southeast Asia in the 1960s during the Vietnam War.In addition, the novel centers on Charles Marlow, a British sailor employed by a European transaction company as captain of one of their steam gravy boats, whereas the film focuses on an American army officer, Benjamin Willard. Another major difference is that the ivory traders are in the Congo of their own greed and free will, whereas the American soldiers are drafted into Vietnam and engage in the war against their will. At the first glance, there seem to be character differences in the novel and film Copollas Willard is nothing like Conrads Marlow.In the novel, Marlow is very eager to meet Kurtz and perhaps gain knowledge near(predicate) the secrets of the ivory trade in the former Zaire. On the other hand, Willard seems to have a death wish. Copolla portrays Willard as a depressed human, having a sold iers killer instinct, throughout the entire film. The effectiveness of point of view withal differentiates the novel and the film. turn it is true that Willard remains on the screen more than anyone else in Apocalypse Now, and his comments are often heard on the films sound track, viewers still do not see others completely from his lieu as readers do in Heart of Darkness.Hence, the film is robbed of some of the emotional intensity that one feels when one reads the novel. This is simply because the narrator in the novel communicates his inhering reaction to the episodes from the past. In the film, the audience does not grasp the extent to which the narrator is profoundly affected by Kurtzs tragedy. Many of Marlows sage reflections about Kurtzs life and death are absent in the film. Moreover, while Coppola success effectivey creates a staggering experience of the wars madness, he seems to put over the moral issues.This is perhaps because of his view of personalizing the novel. T he director identifies so strongly with Kurtz that he modifies the issue of mightiness and disturbs the delicate balance between Conrads fib and the airfield of Vietnam. Apocalypse Now succeeds in making its viewers experience the horror of the war and to realize their own complicity in it, but it fails to highlight the nature of Kurtzs horror illuminated in Heart of Darkness. Coppolas failure to combine Conrads story and the Vietnam War in this respect points largely to The films adaptation of Kurtz.In the novel, Kurtz is corrupted by his isolation in the wilderness, resulting in an obsession with power and unfolding frightening truths about himself I think it had whispered to him things about himself which he did not know, things of which he had no conception till he took counsel with his massive solitude-and the whisper had proved irresistibly fascinating. It echoed loudly indoors him because he was hollow at the core. (133) in the film, Coppola tries to resonate Kurtzs hol lowness by having the character recite The Hollow Men by T. S. Eliot. however this can be seen as more of an emblematic solution that does not somewhat applies in the Vietnam War context. Parallels While the settings, backgrounds, characters, and approaches of the novel and film are somehow different, the narration, structure, and that subject are similar. The following paragraphs summarize some of the essential parallels between Conrads Heart of Darkness and Coppolas Apocalypse Now. In the novel, Marlow introduces his narrative with a musical passage about devotion to efficiency, the idea behind how the ivory trade makes profit, justifying cruel exploitation (Kinder 16).This statement is in like manner applicable to the Vietnam War context as they are both in the stages of occidental imperialism The conquest of the earth, which mostly means the taking it away from those who have a different complexion or slimly flatter noses than ourselves, is not a pretty thing when you look into it too much. What redeems it is the idea only. An idea at the back of it not a sentimental pretence but an idea and an unselfish belief in the idea-something you can set up and bow down before, and offer a sacrifice to. (70)Coppola does not continue this speech in the film, but it becomes the groundwork for the dramatic events that unite Kurtz and Williard the formers recounting of the inoculation story and the latters murder of a wounded Vietnamese woman. The two are driven into a situation in which military efficiency is all told undermined, yet they have been trained to worship it and to internalize it as the source of their own personal pride (Kinder 16). In the novel, although Kurtz embodies all of Europe, he can be viewed as a universal mastermind who shows what lies ahead for those who take the challenge to look into the abyss.Despite the shortcomings in the handling of Kurtz, Copollas conception of film remains a masterful work that complements the power of Conrads vision. The novel and the film embody the theme of insanity and madness and insanity caused by the evil of imperialism. Madness in the novel is the result of world removed from ones normal environment and how people cope with their new environment. The same theme is explored in the film. Many soldiers who are drafted into Vietnam are barely 18 or 19-year-olds. Their mental stability is shaken when they are thrown into a harsh environment, where their lives hang on by the minute.Soldiers such as Lance and Chef are coif to snap at any moment due to the shock and realization of what kind of situation they are in or what is the purpose of fighting comrade men. They also fear the fact that they do not know where they are headed. Copolla and Conrad literally and metaphorically confront the madness and insanity brought about by Western imperialism and colonialism. Through Kurtz and the American soldiers, Copolla is able to portray what war is like for them, and why so many of them suff ered from Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. The film suggests that wars are an imperialistic tool that drives the weak into their destruction.On the other hand, Conrad exposes how the imperialist agenda leads to the exploitation of foreign lands and its people, leaving the imperialist agents themselves deranged and empty (Papke 583). Both the novel and the film also give rise to a race discussion. Conrad and Coppola portray White men as the dominant. They not only rule over their respective crews they also dominate the local peoples. Marlow and Willard look at the native people as if are the savage culture and White men are the civilized one. just it is interesting to note that each of the two main characters see a little of himself in Kurtz, a degenerated savage White man.Coppolas take on Conrads Heart of Darkness has gained much attention from film scholars. In The Power of adaption in Apocalypse Now, Marsha Kinder states that Coppola rarely hesitates to change Conrads story-setti ng, events, characters-whenever the revision is required by the Vietnam context. (14) Moreover, the dialogues in the film, especially Willards voice-over narration, have been attacked by several film critics for sounding more like a joke of author Raymond Chandler than an adaptation of Conrads novel. But a deeper look suggests that Willards character and tone are not intended to be Marlows.To suit the Vietnam context, Willard has been totally transformed into a trained assassin, whose life has been drained of all meaning. Coppola retains Conrads focal image of the river. In the film, just as in the novel, each of the main characters embarks on a literal and metaphoric central journey. Marlows description of the Congo is an enormous snake uncoiled that fascinates him as a snake would a bird. The films structure is controlled by the image of the river that snaked through the war like a main circuit cable, carrying Willard to Cambodia.The novel and the film begin with the protagonist s interpretation of how they got the appointment which necessitated their excursion upriver. Marlow is dispatched to steam up the Congo in to find Mr. Kurtz, while Willard is mandated to journey up the Mekong River in a navy patrol boat to find Col. Kurtz. Moreover, while they travel up a primeval river to fulfill their respective assignments, they speculate about the character of the man they are seeking, with the help of the information they have pieced together about him.In both novel and film, the river eventually leads Marlow and Willard to Kurtz and his dying words of horror (Kinder 15). This final destination for both men is their soul-altering skirmish with Kurtz. Overall, it is an expedition of discovery into the dark heart of man. It is also a close encounter with mans capacity for evil. Coppola agrees with this observation and stated that he also saw Willards voyage upriver as a representation for the journey of life that people take within themselves and during which t hey decide which side to take good or evil.The horror of the world dominated by hollow men is at the center of both Heart of Darkness and Apocalypse Now. Kurtz, in his god-like acousmatic voice and morally terrifying manifestation, is invested with much greatness He fully understands existence in all its repugnance. Repelled and terrified Kurtz pushed himself to go into the very heart of darkness, to fully engage in the dualism (good and evil) of Being. To call Kurtz heroic or rapacious or good or evil, is to miss the point entirely. He is forever shaped by a dark satori, by an understanding of the omnipresent nature of darkness.Marlow and Willard are arguably Kurtzs spiritual sons, and they experience the same realization. Both of them look full face at the great condemnation, at the dark obscurity of Being. Each of them faces moral terror in the shape human conduct forced beyond decent limits and each of them is profoundly transformed by this experience. In her book, Double Exposu re Fiction Into Film, Joy Could Boyum states that in substituting Willard for Marlow, a madman for a sane one, Coppola creates a character incapable of any shock of recognition, a man unable to know evil when he sees it (114).Boyum also argues that there is no discovery for Willard he is a murderer confronting a murder, a madman face to face with madness-it amounts only to a tautology. Thus, Copollas Apocalypse Now can be argued as a movie that has no moral center. Unlike Willard, Marlow returns from the river experience with intact moral perspective and sanity, inviting the readers trust and identification. But one can also say that, like Apocalypse Now, Conrads Heart of Darkness, itself, is a novel that has no moral center. The book suggests that Marlows great realization is that existence itself has no moral heart.The character has not sustained the river journey with his intact moral perspective unchanged. Towards the end of the novel, Marlow is a transformed man, largely isola ted and very different from those people aboard the Nellie. He is alienated forever in his wisdom. Willard, too, in the end, is vastly set outd by his new knowledge. While many critics see Willard as immoral, insane, and unchanging, Kurtzs view of him is more fitting. In the film, Kurtz describes Willard when he sees him for the first time as an errand boy sent by food market clerks to collect a bill. But in the end, Willard becomes wiser. He has been transformed, humbled by his face-to-face confrontation with the darkness natural in Kurtz, in himself, in existence. Therefore, the separate stories of Willards and Marlows river experiences follow a similar narrative pattern and arrive at a similar truth. Apocalypse Now is a thematic and structural analogue to Heart of Darkness. This is perhaps because, Copolla, in his authorial wisdom, fully understood that theme and technique, meaning, and structure are inseparable entities. To tell a story differently is to tell a different story .It seems that, ultimately, Copolla and Conrad tell the same story. Conclusion This paper looks at the differences and parallelisms between Conrads Heart of Darkness and Coppolas Apocalypse Now. In comparing and contrasting the novel and the film, this paper suggests that the film has some significant deviation from the novel. Despite this, however, Apocalypse Now generally remains true to the core of Heart of Darkness. Both the novel and the film follow the same story line but Conrad and Copolla have different ways of presenting this story. This results in surface differences.But a deeper and closer reading of both the novel and the film reveals that they complement each other. This is one of the most important things in adapting a work of literature into a film. Works Cited Boyum, Joy Gould. Double Exposure Fiction Into film. New York Universe Books, 1985. Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness. New York New American Library, 1950. Kinder, Marsha. The Power of Adaptation in Apocalypse Now. Film Quarterly 33. 2 (1979-1980) 12-20. Papke, David Ray. Joseph Conrads Heart of Darkness A Literary Critique of Imperialism. Journal of Maritime rightfulness and Commerce 31. 4 (2000) 583-592.