August 15, 2012 was the 33rd Anniversary of the U.S. premiere of Apocalypse Now, Francis Ford Coppola's adaptation of Joseph Conrad's novella, Heart of Darkness. Joseph Conrad's story is about a boat captain named Marlow who travels along a river deep into "the heart of an immense darkness" in order to find a man named Kurtz. One of the many themes of Heart of Darkness is the idea that a person can lose their mind the further they travel away from civilization into the unknown. This theme is paralleled in Apocalypse Now and by Coppola's own journey in completing his most personal film. The documentary, Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse is a compilation of Eleanor Coppola's interviews, on-the-set footage and secret audio recordings of her husband at his most exposed moments. Coppola's many struggles included an unfinished script, Marlon Brando showing up overweight, typhoons destroying entire sets and Martin Sheen having a heart attack during production. The above cut is a mix of Orson Welles' reading of Heart of Darkness, Apocalypse Now and the documentary Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse.

To me the great hope is that now with these little 8mm video recorders and stuff come out and just people who normally wouldn't make movies are gonna be making them and suddenly one day some little fat girl in Ohio is gonna be the new Mozart and make a beautiful film with her little father's cameracorder and for once this whole professionalism about movies will be destroyed forever, y'know. And it will become an art form... That's my opinion.

- F. F. Coppola