- Ukraine's Zelenskyy quoted "Apocalypse Now" in a speech at the Cannes Film Festival on Tuesday.
- He used a specific scene from the Vietnam War epic to reference Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
- "'I love the smell of napalm in the morning…' Yes, it started in Ukraine in the morning," he said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy quoted the 1979 war drama "Apocalypse Now" while addressing Russia's February invasion during a speech at the Cannes Film Festival on Tuesday.
"Remember how it sounded in the movies? 'You smell that? Napalm, son. Nothing else in the world smells like that. I love the smell of napalm in the morning…'" Zelenskyy said in a video address full of movie references and quotes tying together cinematography and war.
The quote references a scene in director Francis Ford Coppola's Vietnam War epic where actor Robert Duvall, who plays Lieutenant Colonel Bill Kilgore, orders a napalm strike on an enemy position.
"I love the smell of napalm in the morning… someday this war's gonna end," Duvall says to the tune of helicopters and gunfire in the background.
Zelenskyy added a bit of a personal touch to his Tuesday speech, comparing the scene with Russian President Vladimir Putin's February 24 televised war declaration on Ukraine.
"Yes, it started in Ukraine in the morning," he said. "At four o'clock, when we heard the first missile explosions. When the air strikes began. And when death, going to Ukraine across the border, marked its equipment with the swastika analog — the 'Z' symbol."
Zelenskyy went on to talk about the destruction and devastation caused by Russian forces across the country, invoking scenes of mass graves, leveled cities, and forced deportation of Ukrainians into Russia.
As the war inches toward the start of its 13th week, Putin's forces have shown little progress — a failed assault to capture the capital city Kyiv has turned into a slow-grind and bloody campaign in the country's eastern Donbas region.