I thought the war scenes were well shot and easily match anything shot about vietnam. It had that newsreel feel about them.
Maybe Francis Coppola (American Graffiti original producer) should have started production on Apocalypse Now in 1979 and learned how to shoot Vietnam war scenes on a budget.
I believe I've read that before the life-changing success of Star Wars, Lucas was originally slated to direct Apocalypse Now and wanted to do it using that grainy 16mm film stock making it appear like newsreels of the time. This idea worked its way into More American Graffiti and probably helps explain why these Vietnam sequences are the strongest in the film. Bill Norton was no Lucas, however, and didn't handle improvisational scenes well as Lucas had with his actors on the original.
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