Apocalypse Now
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50 free Apocalypse Now trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Apocalypse Now is one of the most storied productions in film history. Francis Ford Coppola set out to make a war film in a few months and came back more than a year later, over budget, exhausted and holding a picture that critics still argue about. This quiz follows Captain Willard up the river to Colonel Kurtz and then steps behind the camera. Expect questions on the characters and the famous scenes, the actors who were cast, replaced or nearly cast, the disasters that hit the shoot, the music, the prizes and the later re-edits. It is written for film fans of every level. The opening questions are ones most people who have seen the film can answer, and the later ones dig into the production stories that turned the shoot into a legend. Every answer comes with a short explanation.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which author's novella Heart of Darkness, set in the 19th-century Congo, inspired Apocalypse Now?
Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad drew the story from his own time as a steamboat captain in Africa; the film moves the river journey to the Vietnam War.
Q 02Which star plays Colonel Kurtz in Apocalypse Now, having arrived on set overweight and unprepared?
Marlon Brando
Marlon Brando was paid $2 million for a month's work, and Coppola hid his size by dressing him in black and filming only his face.
Q 03Which classical piece blares from Kilgore's helicopters as they attack a village in Apocalypse Now?
Ride of the Valkyries
Ride of the Valkyries, from Wagner's opera Die Walküre, plays from loudspeakers mounted on the helicopters throughout the air assault on the village.
Q 04In which country was Apocalypse Now shot, standing in for Vietnam?
The Philippines
The Philippines offered cheap labour and American military hardware, but the planned five-month shoot there dragged on for more than a year.
Q 05Which medical emergency nearly killed Martin Sheen, then 36, during the Apocalypse Now shoot?
A heart attack
A heart attack left Sheen struggling a quarter of a mile to reach help, and he passed it off as heat stroke so the film's backers would not pull the money.
Q 06Which actor lied about his age and was only 14 when he began playing Mr. Clean in Apocalypse Now?
Laurence Fishburne
Laurence Fishburne, billed as Larry, was 14 when shooting began, and the production ran so long that he was 18 by the time the film came out.
Q 07What did the Apocalypse Now production buy from a man who turned out to be a grave robber?
Real human corpses
Real human corpses were bought for the set until police questioned the crew and held their passports, and soldiers took the bodies away. Extras played the dead instead.
Q 08Which weapon's smell does Kilgore praise in the most quoted speech of Apocalypse Now?
Napalm
Napalm earns a short eulogy from Kilgore that UK film fans voted the best movie speech of all time in a 2004 Blockbuster poll.
Q 09Which 1960s rock band recorded The End, the brooding song heard on the Apocalypse Now soundtrack?
The Doors
The Doors' track was remixed specially for the film, and a 289-minute early assembly swapped the composed score for several more of the band's songs.
Q 10Which sport obsesses Lieutenant Colonel Kilgore in Apocalypse Now, even as his men attack a village?
Surfing
Surfing shapes the whole beach assault, and the film is credited with starting a wave-riding culture around Baler, the town where the scenes were shot.
Q 11Which actor earned an Oscar nomination as the helicopter commander Kilgore in Apocalypse Now?
Robert Duvall
Robert Duvall thought the part too over-the-top as written and got Coppola's permission to rework it, asking military men how a tough, unflinching officer would behave.
Q 12Which actor plays the manic photojournalist who greets Willard at Kurtz's base in Apocalypse Now?
Dennis Hopper
Dennis Hopper got the scene after Coppola heard him talking nonstop on location, and the character is said to be modelled on Sean Flynn, a correspondent who vanished in 1970.
Q 13Which actor plays the intelligence colonel who hands Willard his mission early in Apocalypse Now?
Harrison Ford
Q 21Which film beat Apocalypse Now to Best Picture at the 1980 Oscars, winning five awards in all?
Kramer vs. Kramer
Kramer vs. Kramer swept the main prizes, while Coppola's epic converted only two of its eight nominations, for cinematography and sound.
Q 22Which Italian cinematographer won his first Oscar for the jungle imagery of Apocalypse Now?
Vittorio Storaro
Vittorio Storaro was making his American film debut, and even critics who were cool on the story acclaimed the way the film looked.
Q 23Which writer drafted the first Apocalypse Now script after asthma kept him out of the Vietnam War?
John Milius
Harrison Ford took the minor part after James Caan asked for too much money, and the film reached cinemas two years after his breakthrough in Star Wars.
Q 14Which animal surprises Chef and Willard as they search the jungle for mangoes in Apocalypse Now?
A tiger
A tiger sends Chef into a brief mental breakdown, the moment when Willard starts to see cracks forming in the boat's crew.
Q 15In which country does Colonel Kurtz rule his remote jungle outpost in Apocalypse Now?
Cambodia
Cambodia is where Kurtz commands American and local troops who worship him, from a Khmer temple strewn with the remains of his victims.
Q 16Which natural disaster wrecked the Apocalypse Now sets and shut the production down for weeks?
A typhoon
A typhoon named Olga wrecked between 40 and 80 per cent of the sets at Iba, and most of the cast and crew flew home for six to eight weeks.
Q 17Which actor began Apocalypse Now as Captain Willard before Martin Sheen replaced him weeks later?
Harvey Keitel
Harvey Keitel was cast on the strength of Mean Streets, but Coppola felt he struggled to play Willard as a passive onlooker. Reportedly only four days of reshoots were needed.
Q 18Which filmmaker was first lined up to direct Apocalypse Now, before Francis Ford Coppola took over?
George Lucas
George Lucas planned a cheap 16 mm shoot in documentary style while the war was still being fought, then put it aside for American Graffiti and Star Wars.
Q 19What does a drunk Martin Sheen really punch and break in the hotel-room opening of Apocalypse Now?
A mirror
A mirror that was no prop cut his hand badly, yet Sheen insisted on finishing the scene and later called it an exorcism of his drinking.
Q 20At which festival did Apocalypse Now screen as a work in progress and still share the top prize?
Cannes
Cannes had never shown a work in progress in competition before, and the jury's decision to split the Palme d'Or was met with some boos and jeers.
John Milius was paid $15,000 by Coppola to write it and went on to produce ten drafts running to more than a thousand pages.
Q 24Which US military branch crews the boat carrying Army Captain Willard upriver in Apocalypse Now?
The Navy
The Navy boat is run by Chief Petty Officer Phillips, who keeps a tight ship and clashes with Willard over whose orders come first.
Q 25Which weapon kills the boat's commander, Chief Phillips, as Apocalypse Now nears Kurtz's outpost?
A spear
A spear thrown from the riverbank impales the Chief, who tries to pull Willard onto its point with his last strength before Willard suffocates him.
Q 26Which weapon does Captain Willard use to kill Colonel Kurtz at the climax of Apocalypse Now?
A machete
A machete attack comes while villagers carry out a ritual sacrifice outside, and Kurtz's followers bow to Willard as he leaves with the colonel's writings.
Q 27Which animal was really slaughtered on camera by an Ifugao tribe for the ending of Apocalypse Now?
A water buffalo
A water buffalo died in a genuine ritual that Coppola and his wife had watched earlier, and the American Humane Association rated the film unacceptable.
Q 28Which drug does the boat's gunner Lance say he has taken during the bridge scene in Apocalypse Now?
LSD
LSD is still working on Lance when he sets off a smoke grenade further upriver, drawing the enemy fire that kills Mr. Clean.
Q 29Which poet's The Hollow Men does Colonel Kurtz recite shortly before his death in Apocalypse Now?
T. S. Eliot
T. S. Eliot had prefaced that poem with an epigraph about a dead Kurtz, taken from the very novella the film is based on.
Q 30Which star was Coppola's first choice to play Willard in Apocalypse Now but would not leave America?
Steve McQueen
Steve McQueen also wanted a $3 million fee, and when he dropped out Coppola had to hand back $5 million of the money he had raised.