The Vulnerability of Man

The Vulnerability of Man

Nature dwarfs us. The jungle absorbs us. Struggling to survive in the middle of an enticing jungle, one truly challenges his own restraints to the temptation of the jungle - of the horror of an abyss which lies so closely beneath us. All of our days and ways are a fragile structure balanced agitatedly atop the hungry jaws of nature that will effortless devour us. A happy life is a daily amnesty from this knowledge. Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness and Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now share a common theme where the feeble human cannot restrain the domination of the jungle. Those who live in a fool's paradise will die in a fool's paradise, and those who discover the horrors of life will die in the jungle. Colonel Kurtz in Apocalypse Now and Captain Kurtz in Heart of Darkness have both been lured into a "God-like" life in the jungle. Willard and Marlow both travel a long way down a river to attempt to rescue Kurtz, or kill him. The Kurtz in both stories have lost restraint to the wilderness, while Willard and Marlow fight hard to keep theirs.

The opening scene in the movie captures a distraught Willard having just returned from the Vietnam War. Willard is pouncing around in his hotel room as though a savage. Only later it is revealed that he is resisting the temptation of returning to the jungle. "When I was here, I wanted to be there; when I was there all I could think about was getting back in the jungle" (Captain Willard). This scene suggests Willard's strength to resist temptation. Having already escaped from Vietnam once, he will do it again. The matter is however, the difficulty of withstanding the jungle is like pulling two burly magnets in opposite directions. Willard himself deals with a desire to escape into the jungle. He is uncertain of his reasons, but his physicality and mentality demands it. In Apocalypse Now, the Vietnam War only plays a surface role, a parallel for the jungle, in which both display the effects of corruption and destruction on man. The true significance of the story lays beneath the surface, as the horror of existence, the horror of strength, and the horror of an ability to kill without feeling.

In the beginning of the novel, Marlow and four other Englishmen are stranded close to the mouth of the Thames River outside of London. "The flood had made, the wind was nearly calm, and being bound down the river, the only thing for it was to come to and wait for the turn of the tide" (1). Man is powerless to the forces of nature. This opening scene provides the perfect foreshadowing for the rest of the novel. A man has no control over the strengths of nature. If the wind doesn't blow, the boat cannot sail and the men are marooned. The only control that a man possesses is his self-restraint - his ability to contain himself from the temptations of the jungle. Marlow, like Willard deals with the compelling pull of the jungle. Heart of Darkness takes place in Africa, along the Congo River. It is Marlow's first time traveling into a country so dissimilar, primitive, and uncivilized from his own. Yet, he is drawn into the corruption and despair in the heart of human existence. Marlow's growing enthusiasm and admiralty towards Captain Kurtz leaves Marlow analyzing the reason of Captain Kurtz's fall into insanity.

In Apocalypse Now, as they travel along the river in Vietnam to Cambodia to meet Colonel Kurtz, Chef insists on venturing into the forests to search for mangos. The cinematographer places Chef and Willard as human specks at the foot of towering trees. They struggle as they cross over each of the tree's colossal roots. Chef and Willard are conquered by nature at this point. Nature is too immense. The wilderness surrounds them. Chef and Willard are inept in the starving forest that is waiting to feed upon its next prey by producing another Kurtz. It is as though the world is too much with them; nature is too much with them. The jungle is inescapable. The scene of Chef and Willard among the gigantic trunks of the tree is significant in symbolizing the power of the jungle over man.

As Marlow continues to tell his story of his journey to Kurtz, he mentions the snake-like shape of the Congo River.

But there was in it one river especially, a mighty big river, that you could see on the map, resembling an immense snake uncoiled, with its head in the sea, its body at rest curving afar over a vast country, and its tail lost in the depths of the land. And as I looked at the map of it in a shop window, it fascinated me as a snake would a bird - a silly little bird (6).

Joseph Conrad sets up an ominous atmosphere for Marlow before he even begins his journey. The snake-like shape of the Congo River suggests evil as a result of the happenings in the Garden of Eden. In this novel, it is a foreshadowing of the evil that Marlow will encounter during his journey. Joseph Conrad uses the Congo River to symbolize the treacherousness of nature. Marlow is the silly little bird believing he is capable of escape. The question remains in whether the snake will swallow the little bird, and make him its own. This scene and the previously mentioned scene of the trees in Apocalypse Now both achieve one point, that nature towers over us.

Willard is sent on a mission to kill Colonel Kurtz; the man before him had failed to do so and instead joined Colonel Kurtz. Willard is eager to meet Colonel Kurtz and constantly analyzes Colonel Kurtz's departure from civilization. A successful man such as Colonel Kurtz has no reason