An example that is in the book is when Marlow has his appointment with the doctor. The doctor measures Marlow's skull to compare its size at the present time to the size of his skull upon his return from the Congo. The thought is that a civilized man's skull is a different size than a savage's skull. When Marlow asks the doctor what the results of this test have been in the past, the doctor comments that there were none because there has been no civilized person that has returned from Congo. An example that was in the movie is when Willard faces his own personality of whether or not to complete his soldierly mission of killing Kurtz or to abort it. Willard would still be civil if he completed his mission. If he didn't complete, then the Vietnam jungle would have conquered him. One significant similarity of the main characters in each piece is that every character has sympathy for Kurtz and when he dies. Marlow and Willard see a little of them in this degenerated savage.
Although there are many similarities between the two, there are many discrepancies that make Heart of Darkness and "Apocalypse Now " opposite. The settings of the two were different and written in different time periods. Heart of Darkness was written in the late nineteenth century and was set in a wild African jungle frontier. "Apocalypse Now " was released in 1979 and was set in a war and hostile Vietnam. Conrad uses ivory traders as his characters in Heart of Darkness and the ivory trade in "Apocalypse Now, " Coppola uses soldiers and the Vietnam War. Another difference in the two is that the ivory traders were in the Congo of their own free will and greed. In "Apocalypse Now, " the soldiers were not there for their own free will; many of the soldiers were drafted into Vietnam. The main characters in the two are different. Marlow was eager to meet Kurtz and learned secrets of the ivory trade. On the other hand, Willard seemed to have a death wish.