It’s hard to believe that Apocalypse Now was made 40 years ago. To celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Oscar-winning Vietnam cult war epic, Studiocanal is going to release a special, never-before-seen directors cut that has been restored into 4K Ultra HD with breathtaking realism by Francis Ford Coppola himself.
Everything old is new again
This is the first time that Apocalypse Now has been restored from the original negative. However, this is not the first time the movie has had a reboot. In 2000, to celebrate the films 21st anniversary Apocalypse Now Redux was released. It went for a whopping 202 minutes.
Apocalypse Now was released on August 15, 1979 and it went on to be nominated for 8 Academy Awards (including Best Picture). It won 2 Academy Award for Best Cinematography and Best Sound, 2 BAFTAs for Best Direction and Best Supporting Actor and the Palme d’Or in Cannes.
The film starred Academy Award winners Marlon Brando and Robert Duvall. It also features Martin Sheen, Dennis Hopper, Laurence Fishburne, and Harrison Ford.
It was rumored that both Steve McQueen, Al Pacino, Tommy Lee Jones, Keith Carradine, Nick Nolte, and even Harrison Ford were all approached to play Willard. Coppola also approached Jack Nicholson, Robert Redford, and James Caan to play either Kurtz or Willard.
Apocalypse Now follows Army Captain Willard (Sheen), a troubled man sent on a dangerous and mesmerizing odyssey into Cambodia to assassinate a renegade American colonel named Kurtz (Brando), who has succumbed to the horrors of war and barricaded himself in a remote outpost.
The film certainly had its fair share of troubles. It was scheduled to be shot over a 5 month period, but it ended up taking more than a year. Expensive sets were destroyed by bad weather, Brando allegedly arrived on the set overweight and unprepared, and Sheen was also claimed to have had a breakdown that caused him to have a near-fatal heart attack while on set. Coppola also had to edit over a million feet of film!
It’s certainly worth a look
The trailer for Apocalypse Now Final Cut looks great, but it does have quite a different feel to it. The grade looks to be completely different to that of the original.
The fact that Apocalypse Now has been remastered and restored into 4K Ultra HD certainly shows you how well film stands up, even in today’s digital age.
Coppola’s Apocalypse Now Final Cut is sure to be a hit for those who remember the original film, as well as for those younger audiences who may be seeing the film for the first time.
You will be able to see Apocalypse Now Final Cut in cinemas from August 13th.
