The propeller of a ceiling fan slices relentlessly through the air and through a song by The Doors humming with anxiety that clings to the breeze. It heralds the end – though Captain Willard’s descent into the soot-blackened heart of the jungle is only about to begin. He must find the missing Colonel Kurtz, who appears to have lost his mind and to be planning a coup. Returning to the war-doomed south of Vietnam, he begins his journey upriver to kill Kurtz – who increasingly seems to be a fictional figure. The absence of reason, nostril-clogging napalm and cynicism twist and turn like the river itself, pushing everyone to the ultimate edge.

A classic composed of thousands of iconic moments – veritable holy relics of the war film genre. In one of them, Marlon Brando’s Kurtz slowly, cautiously emerges from the smoke-blackened bamboo. In another, Wagner’s militaristic Valkyries tear through the sky, sowing firebombs across Vietnam. In yet another, Martin Sheen’s character feels nothing anymore – the blankness of his stare confirms that only moments ago, there was a school here. Now it’s just burnt pencil cases. Coppola, transposing Joseph Conrad’s 1899 novel Heart of Darkness to the Vietnam War, hotly criticised at the time, in the 1970s, lived through hell himself in order to depict hell. The film is surrounded by no shortage of legends and myths regarding its agonising production. But a few truths stand firm – the epic received the Palme d’Or at Cannes, eight Oscar nominations, and is one of the cornerstones of American film.

A restored director’s cut will be screened at RIGA IFF.