A Surfer Examines Robert Duvall’s Most Famous Line Ever, In One of His Most Iconic Roles
One of the most recognizable images from the film Apocalypse Now, this scene didn’t appear in the final cut, but later in 2001’s “redux,” depicting the patrol boat’s crew playing a silly frat-boy prank, totally ruining the exquisitely ironic tone of the original version. Photo: Apocalypse Now production stills
“I love the smell of napalm in the morning.”
I came across an online article the other day, titled “Why This Iconic Line Is Still Quoted Today.” The accompanying photograph featured the legendary actor Robert Duvall, who passed away on February 15 at age 95. The article’s opening sentence asserted that, “Robert Duvall’s line from his role as Lt. Col. Bill Kilgore in 1979’s [Vietnam war epic] Apocalypse Now remains one of cinema’s most memorable.”
The article goes on to report how in his 1999 retro-review, the late film critic Roger Ebert described Duvall’s line as “Unforgettable,” as he praised Duvall’s “frightening emptiness” in the role. Not to be outdone, the Australian Museum of Screen Culture called Duvall’s line “…one of the most iconic lines in cinema history, in one of the most striking and iconic scenes in cinema history, as it demonstrated the immorality and absurdity of the Vietnam War, embodied by Lt. Col. Kilgore.”
“I love the smell of napalm in the morning” is ranked #12 on the American Film Institute’s list of the Top 100 most memorable lines in the past 100 years. Appropriate praise for Duvall, screenwriter John Milius, and director Francis Ford Coppola, the title of the article pointing to the enduring impact of this particular scene from Apocalypse Now (itself #30 on the AFI’s “Top 100 Greatest Movies” list). Trouble is, however, everybody’s talking about the wrong line.
For those of you unfamiliar with the cinematic scenario in question, let me set it up for you: A cynical military intelligence agent named Willard has been dispatched deep into Vietnam’s northwest province, with orders to assassinate a rogue Green Beret colonel. His plan is to take a Navy PBR patrol boat as far up river as possible, picking up the colonel’s trail along the way. Escorting the PBR to an appropriate river mouth is the U.S. Army’s fabled First of the 9th Air Cavalry, who, having traded horses for Huey choppers, is being led by one Lt. Colonel Bill Kilgore, whom they rendezvous with in midst of a pitched battle. Among the boat’s crew is a naïve young Californian named Lance Johnson, apparently a renowned Malibu surfer “back in the world.” Ignoring the ensuing carnage, Kilgore reveals himself to be an enthusiastic surfer himself, delighted to meet Lance and swap surf talk. From Milius’ original script:
KILGORE
“Lance Johnson the surfer?”
LANCE
“Yes, sir.”
KILGORE
“It’s an honor to meet you, Lance. I’ve admired your nose riding for years. I like your cutback too. I think you have the best cutback there is.”
LANCE
“Thank you, sir.”
KILGORE
“You can cut out the ‘sir’ crap, Lance. I’m Bill Kilgore. I’m a goofy foot. Mike’s from San Diego, Johnny from Malibu. Pretty solid surfers, none of us are anywhere near your class though. We do a lot of surfing here.”
Later that evening (at a post-battle beach BBQ) Willand makes a suggestion as to what route might best suit his needs, pointing at a map to the Naung River.
KILGORE
“That village you’re pointing at is kinda hairy, Willard.”
WILLARD
“What do you mean hairy, sir?”
KILGORE
“It’s hairy. Got some pretty heavy ordnance there. I’ve lost a few recon ships there now and again. Mike, do you know anything about that point at Vin..Drin..Dop?”
MIKE
“Oh, that’s a fantastic peak.”
KILGORE
“Peak?”
MIKE
“About six feet. It’s got both a long right and left slide. It’s unbelievable, just Tube City.”
KILGORE
“Well why the hell didn’t you tell me that before? There aren’t any good peaks in this whole shitty country. It’s all goddamn beachbreak.”
MIKE
“It’s really hairy in there, sir. That’s where we lost McDonnell. They shot the hell out of us. That’s Charlie’s point.”
WILLARD
“Sir, we can go there tomorrow at dawn. There’s always a good off-shore breeze in the morning.”
KILGORE
“We’ll pick your boat up and put it down like a baby, right where you want it. This is First of the Ninth, Air Cav, son. Air mobile. I can take that point and hold it as long as I like, and you can get anywhere you want up that river that suits you, young captain.”
This is the setup for the iconic scene that follows, in which during an extraordinary battle sequence at the Viet Cong’s river-mouth stronghold, Kilgore orders his surfing soldiers to hit the waves, exhorting that they “either fight, or surf.” The aforementioned “napalm in the morning” line comes only after the village had been subdued by an A-1 Skyraider bombing run, and the boys have caught their waves. Presented by itself, without context, it hardly demonstrates “the immorality and absurdity of the Vietnam war” as does Milius’ construct that sees an obsessive surfer attacking and bombing a Vietnamese village simply to catch a few waves.
“I wrote eleven drafts of Apocalypse Now,” John Milius explained, when interviewed for my 2010 documentary Hollywood Don’t Surf. “Always from the beginning, it had to have surfing in it, because there was surf in Vietnam. I just couldn’t wait to get to the surfing scenes, because they were so outrageous.”
Not that Milius thought any of these scenes would eventually make it from the page to the screen.
“I thought, really, this will all be cut,” Milus went on to say. “Especially the most famous line. That will be the first thing that gets taken out.”
And the famous line he’s referring to is not “I love the smell of napalm in the morning,” but the line leading to the hard cut taking us out of the scene included above…and into both cinematic and surfing, history. It plays out with Duvall’s wonderfully acted, surf-crazed colonel’s frothing.
KILGORE
“Hell, a six-foot peak! Mike, take Lance with you and let him pick out a board. And bring me my Yater Spoon, the eight-six.”
MIKE
“I don’t know, sir…it’s…it’s…”
KILGORE
“What is it soldier?”
MIKE
“It’s pretty hairy in there. It’s Charlie’s point…”
KILGORE
“Charlie don’t surf!”
“Charlie Don’t Surf.” This, then, is the line that all those cinephiles should be pushing up to the top of their lists, the iconic, undeniably ironic line that truly defines this classic movie scene.
“That’s my favorite line,” claimed its screenwriter. “’Probably the best one I ever wrote.”
But don’t just take John Milius’ word for it.
“When Kilgore says ‘Charlie don’t surf,’” recalls acclaimed director Steven Spielberg, also interviewed in Hollywood Don’t Surf. “I think that’s one of the most classic lines John has ever written.”
