7. Francis Ford Coppola Makes A Joke - Conjures Up The Most Iconic Opening Sequence Ever
Apocalypse Now's hellish and turbulent production process is something of a legend in itself, and absolutely the reason that the movie turned out so damn good - all the mayhem and craziness is right up their on the screen. But the arduous production process also meant that there was literally hundreds of hours of footage to scrawl through, meaning that Francis Ford Coppola had a lot of work on his hands when it came to putting together a cut of the movie. And whilst going through some of that footage, he stumbled upon the a reel that would later make up the film's iconic opening sequence, what with the static shot of the tree-line, helicopters and napalm explosion paired with the unforgettable Doors track "The End." But it wasn't always meant to be like that: in the audio commentary for
Apocalypse Now, Coppola admitted that its inception was the result of a "complete accident." Looking through the footage just 'cause it was there, Coppola joked that it would be funny to play the song The End here, if this were going at the beginning of the movie. Realising that he had just said the best sentence of his entire life, that's exactly what he decided to do.