‘The End’: The single greatest needle drop in all of 1970s cinema
There’s always been a symbiotic relationship between music and cinema in many ways. Although both of them are fine art forms and get their points across incredibly well, it’s impossible to think of a perfect film that doesn’t have some electrifying score behind it or at least some amazing sound design to move the movie forward. But as most directors have learned all too well in the past few decades, why try to come up with a new score when the best music is looking you in the face?
Although it can be hard getting licensing agreements from different bands and singers for the use of their song, it’s normally worth it to see how it looks in the context of a scene. Wayne’s World wouldn’t have been the same without ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ playing over the scene of them in the car, and no matter how one feels about the Marvel Cinematic Universe, there’s something about Baby Groot listening to ‘Mr Blue Sky’ that is enough to put a smile on everyone’s face when they watched Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.
But taking the lighthearted approach is almost the easy way out when it comes to the best needle drops in movies. The whole point behind any film is to have someone look at the world in a different way when they walk out of the theatre, and there was no other director more interested in pushing the audience’s buttons than Stanley Kubrick.
Despite him being one of the most visionary directors of his time, nothing that he did was exactly meant for the masses. These were practically arthouse projects that happened to have massive funding behind them, and while 2001: A Space Odyssey contains one of the finest uses of classical music in all of cinema, Apocalypse Now has the best case for pop songs being featured in movies.
But first, we need some backstory to understand why this works so well. At the start of the 1970s, most of the world was still reeling over the effects of the Vietnam War, and the survivors in the US army were never going to be the same. Most of them had been drafted and saw things that no one should ever have to see, but when looking at it through the eyes of Martin Sheen’s Benjamin Willard, putting ‘The End’ by The Doors in the middle of the carnage is the perfect choice.
While The Doors never defined themselves as an outright political band, every one of their greatest tunes was about trying to challenge the status quo. Nothing they played was meant to fit into the realm of pop music, and for a time that was all about hippies spreading the gospel of peace and love, Jim Morrison was reminding everyone that the world could be darker than everyone expected.
They certainly had more on-the-nose songs from this time, like ‘The Unknown Soldier’, but ‘The End’ sticks out much better because of its second half. The song itself was already an experiment to see what the band could do without a set verse and chorus, so Morrison took that time to read his poetry and let loose, eventually channelling Oedipus Rex and mindlessly saying ‘fuck’ before the other musicians crash to a halt around him.
Since this is soundtracking Willard’s breakdown in his room, the song is practically a soundtrack to someone losing their mind, which only became more prophetic when Sheen hurt himself on set. It was bad enough trying to act out someone falling apart, but after he started to have heart trouble during the making of the film, it was clear that a lot of that passion Morrison was talking about hit a little too close to the chest.
But since the Vietnam War had only ended four years before Apocalypse Now came out, using The Doors’ classic here was a perfect example of wordless storytelling. This was a reminder of what could happen if people had stayed in those jungles for much longer, and when looking at the state of mind Willard has throughout this scene, Morrison was right on the money when he said, “Lost in a Roman wilderness of pain and all the children are insane.”
