heart of darkness/apocalypse now - exploration of the concept of journey
...e had ended that journey physically, but the battle had captured his mind and this made Willard return to fight in the Vietnam War. This led to more expeditions on his way to find Kurtz. The first journey we see on screen is the physical journey that Willard goes on to find the mysterious Kurtz. This physical journey takes Willard from his home into the tragedy of the Vietnam War. It also takes him into the village of Kurtz and his followers. Through this physical journey he also experiences an inner journey. The inner journey he goes through is the realisation that the war isn’t as glorious as he originally thought it was. He becomes more aware of the ironies of war and the “darkness of human nature”. He also realises the hypocrisy of western imperialism as the film is very anti-war. We can see that the Americans set out to help innocent citizens but in the end they kill the victims of communism. Another hypocrisy is the way the Americans are spending so much time trying to find Kurtz so they can assassinate him for killing two people who could have very well been working against America, when they are killing hundreds of innocent people each day. One of the most important inner journeys he goes through is the decision which he faces, either kill Kurtz and then return to civilisation or join Kurtz/take over his position, which would ultimately turn him into the exact man that he was ordered to kill. During the physical journey Willard has an imaginative journey. He wonders what the mysterious Kurtz is like and forms a picture in his mind of what he believes Kurtz will look, act and think like. We then see the journeys that Kurtz undertakes. An inner journey that Kurtz experiences is his descent into madness. However, some say that his behaviour is actually quite normal when you look at the context of the war. Kurtz also realises the hypocrisy of the military army when his career is ruined for killing two Vietnamese intelligence agents. As a result of this event he becomes a leader of his own settlement. We do not see the physical journey that Kurtz goes through but we do hear about it through other people. For example, one of Kurtz followers at his village talks very highly of Kurtz and how he came to be their leader. We also see the inner journey that Kurtz has experienced through his dialogue when he is talking to Willard about the time they inoculated children for polio and then the Vietcong guerrillas came into the village and cut off the left arm (inoculated arm) of each child. In this scene Kurtz tells us of his realisation that the Vietcong guerrillas have no morals. They have inner strength to kill without feeling, without judgement, “because it’s judgement that defeats us”. In addition we realise that Kurtz sees Willard as his way out of this evil that has sarcome him and this is the reason he lets Willard kill him. We again see the inner journey he has gone through by his final words before death, “the horror, the horror”. He has finally accepted the evil that has held him for so long. In Heart of Darkness we see many different journeys that Marlow goes through. The theme of journey started from Joseph Conrad’s childhood dream to travel down the African Congo. Marlow’s physical journey is the boat trip down the African Congo to hunt for ivory. He does this by taking the place of a steamboat captain who has recently died. While hunting for ivory Marlow’s mission is to find the mythical ivory seeker, famously known as Kurtz. As in Apocalypse Now the Hypocrisy of Imperialism is portrayed in the novella. The men ho work for the company describe their work as a trade and believe their treatment of the natives is going to bring them into civilisation. The inner journey that Marlow experiences is...