10 Movies That Are Still Great After Twenty Viewings

4. Apocalypse Now

It doesn't make a whole lot of sense that a film about the Vietnam War bordering on three hours can exhibit the trait of "endlessly rewatchable," but Francis Ford Coppola's 1979 masterpiece, Apocalypse Now, does exactly that: indeed, it is perhaps a more compulsive movie than Coppola's most renowned masterpiece, The Godfather - and a better movie, too. Though the picture is indeed set during the Vietnam conflict, it isn't strictly about the war - it is a journey into the human condition at its most primal; a dizzying, hallucinogenic odyssey that chronicles one man's mission into the very "Heart of Darkness" (good thing it was based on Conrad's novel of the same name, then) as he begins to lose his mind (and his senses) to the horrors of the jungle.

Apocalypse Now is an episodic movie, in the sense that it moves from one set piece to another, almost as if it one were a chapter in a novel. Which means, of course, that almost every section of the film results in a "Oh, I love this part" moment, driving up its rewatchability factor. The encompassing, dream-like tone that carries Martin Sheen's Captain Willard down river to the compound where Marlon Brando's enigmatic Colonel Kurtz waits in the shadows is perhaps its most power attribute, however; Apocalypse Now sucks you in, puts you in Willard's shoes, and disorientates you from the very start to the very end - you, too, must complete the journey.

It is a raw, suffocating and surprisingly cathartic film - one that remains utterly engrossing no matter how many times you sit down to take that fateful journey into the unknown.