“Heart of Darkness” and “Apocalypse Now”
I read Joseph Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness” (1902), which explores man’s capacity to both commit atrocities and deny them in the context of Imperialism. I then went on to watch “Apocalypse Now” (1979), a film by Francis Ford Copolla which is a loose adaptation of Conrad’s book. It also explores the same themes, but within the context of the Vietnam War. In making that translating not so much Conrad’s stories, but his ideas into a different setting, Copolla had created perhaps the greatest film adaptation ever—if not the best film ever (as it is in my opinion). In doing so, he created a blueprint for every filmmaker out to make an adaptation. “Apocalypse Now” is a classic film that can stand on its own; it definitely was the right choice to stray from the film’s original inspiration. A strict retelling of Marlow’s voyage up the Congo river wouldn’t have been as good.
And on another note, because of the nature of film, “Apocalypse Now” can express things in ways that a novel like “Heart of Darkness” cannot. Take for example the famous scene where Lieutenant Colonel Kilgore recites the lines “I love the smell of napalm in the morning.” He delivers this ode to war as, in the background, there are wounded American soldiers crawling on the ground, crying for morphine, and further afield, innocent Vietnamese citizens (who in a previous deliberately placed shot are shown living their peaceful day-to-day lives) are being walked onboard American helicopters at gunpoint as newly acquired prisoners of war. Irony can find no better place to express itself but in film.
Books, of course, can also express things that films cannot. These two different medias, however, can be united in their common message as these two examples show. But how to translate a book to a film or a film to a book, is something else, which most—unless they’re Francis Ford Copolla—should be weary of, lest some great works are ruined. :O
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