MovieChat Forums > Apocalypse Now (1979) Discussion > A somewhat strange conversation?

A somewhat strange conversation?

posted 8 years ago by flyingmythbuster
7 replies | jump to latest

Just saw a little snippet of the film while surfing the channels. That snippet included a conversation between Kurtz and Willard where Kurtz asks: "Where are you from?" "Toledo" replies Willard. "Is it close to a river?" "Which river?" "The Ohio" "That's about 150 miles away." Now I realize that this is small talk filler but I can't help but wonder if a native of Toledo would point out the a small river runs through Toledo and that Toledo is on Lake Erie Just south of the St-Clair river that divides Canada and the US. Much more, you would expect a Colonel to know that Toledo is very close to Detroit and miles away from the Ohio. Really sloppy work by the scriptwriters. Just saying.

[–] bravomailer 8 years ago

A lot of Kurtz's lines were ad-libbed by Brando and poor Sheen had to go along.

[–] jbaddock 8 years ago

I suspect that Brando was trying to get across the idea that Kurtz was no longer in the real world, so to speak, and so was ad-libbing a conversation that was never going to make much sense.

[–] DepheatingRub 8 years ago

I suspect likewise. Willard is set in front of the legendary soldier, expecting some of that incisive mind being groomed for a top spot in the corporation, and instead hears rambling soliloquy about gardenias.

[–] Lester_Burnham_Risen 8 years ago

and instead hears rambling soliloquy about gardenias

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Yes that was the reason , ie to show that Kurts really does not want to be there in Nam and already knows he will never see any such beauty again

http://www.kindleflippages.com/ablog/

[–] zelena33 8 years ago

1230 01:54:28,695 --> 01:54:30,112 Where are you from, Willard?
1231 01:54:35,702 --> 01:54:37,286 I'm from Ohio, sir.
1232 01:54:43,251 --> 01:54:45,878 - Were you born there? - Yes, sir.
1233 01:54:48,048 --> 01:54:50,716 - Whereabouts? - Toledo, sir.
1234 01:54:58,058 --> 01:54:59,850 How far are you from the river?
1235 01:55:06,817 --> 01:55:08,526 The Ohio River, sir?
1236 01:55:11,071 --> 01:55:12,738 About 200 miles.
1237 01:55:20,747 --> 01:55:23,708 I went down that river once when I was a kid.

The film is Heart of Darkness, it was all about "going upriver", that was the idea. I don't see that as "sloppy" at all. Kurtz was breaking open the conversation with Willard by making a link between them about rivers. And referencing some episode from Kurtz's formative experience that echoed with his fate upriver.

Wouldn't it be kind of unsupportably dorky for Willard to interject "er, actually sir, Toledo is..."? He's an operations officer, he has some basic interpersonal sensitivity.

[–] joshua_carpino 8 years ago

"The film is Heart of Darkness, it was all about "going upriver", that was the idea. I don't see that as "sloppy" at all. Kurtz was breaking open the conversation with Willard by making a link between them about rivers. And referencing some episode from Kurtz's formative experience that echoed with his fate upriver.

Wouldn't it be kind of unsupportably dorky for Willard to interject "er, actually sir, Toledo is..."? He's an operations officer, he has some basic interpersonal sensitivity."

exactly. and that's just for a start. this is not a film to bring nitpicky *beep* to. for whatever reason the kurtz scenes continue to confound viewers of an otherwise(justly)revered film.

[–] Henry_Swizzlesticks_the_Second 8 years ago

It's a great conversation.

Kurtz doesn't know or care about the geography of Ohio.

His only concern is a memory of gardenias from his youth that he associates with Ohio.