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Opening scene- Apocalypse now

 Opening Scene- Apocalypse now


The opening of Apocalypse now is a wide establishing shot of the Vietnamese jungle, the jungle gets blown up and the green trees turned bright orange as it is blown up, this foreshadow the future themes of chaos and also the narrative and Willard will eventually end up in Vietnam. The Vietnam War was, from an Americans point of view, was a damaging war to many soldiers and also to America as a nation because of the fact they lost, Coppola wanted to show the damaging affects of the Vietnam War using the character of Willard therefore the explosion further highlights the way Vietnam War damaged Willard, this is further shown when Coppola has made Willards face faded over the scenes of war. This shows Willard is haunted by war. the scenes of war slowly fade into Willards ceiling fan, this shows that Willard is coming back into realty and the audience can see he isn't in a war environment. The ceiling fan fades back to the war scenes and the audience can see that Willard is missing the war and is affected by what he has done. The ceiling fan fading back into war scenes also shows how Willards situation will change in the movie. The colour scheme throughout the intro is mainly black, orange and a bit of green, the orange is mainly to show fire and explosions which is what mostly happens in war. The bright orange and yellows is behind Willards faded face and it also shows the things Willard has possibly seen during his career. Other shots like the messy surrounding and glass of alcohol show Willard is suffering due to war whether he misses it or Is haunted by it.  The ceiling fan is portrayed a lot because it is similar to a helicopter propeller this further supports the idea that Willard is obsessed with the war, most of the close up shots of Willard his facial expression is bare and he is focusing, the way he is faded on top of most of the war scenes shows he is focusing on the war. The lighting is dim because of where Willard is, he is in a dim room where the blinds are closed, this just shows that Willard is not mentally stable most likely due to war.  The opening scene establishes Willards mental breakdown about the war.

The main setting for the bottom layer is Vietnam, which is where the war is happening. This also where most of the movie will be set. The other setting is Willards room, his room seems messy but we can't. see all of it only his table where he has pictures cigarettes and other stuff. One of the most meaning objects is probably the helicopters as we seem them multiple times throughout the opening scene because there were around 12,000 helicopters used in the Vietnam War and the sound of helicopters is repeated throughout the film. The Vietnam jungle is covered by yellow gas which is napalm gas which was commonly used throughout the Vietnam, the opening sequence is to set up the audience for the rest of the movie, we establish the setting as well as the main character. The main use of sound in the opening sequence is the song the end, this song is used because the Vietnam war killed and damaged a lot of Americans. The Vietnam War is often seen as the biggest failure to USA because of the size of their country and military. The movie starts with the lyric  "This is the end" to be ironic, this lyric however summarise the mood throughout the movie because of how damaging the war was. The other most used sound effect is the helicopter propeller, it is mainly used to show Willards mental breakdown due to the war but it also used to foreshadow the upcoming chaos of the story.


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