Willard travels up the river to find Kurtz and kill him in the film Apocalypse Now. What is the name of this fictional Cambodian river in the film?

The fictional Nung River is the setting of a literal and metaphorical journey in the movie, Apocalypse Now. As this river takes a boat to Cambodia and Kurtz, the crew moves beyond civilization to the 'heart of darkness' within themselves. Once Chef (Frederic Forrest) and Willard (Martin Sheen) venture into the jungle, Chef screams that he should not have left the boat. “Never get off the boat,” Willard says in narration, for the river is a sanctuary from the darkness of the jungle. This river symbolizes transformation, as when Willard, hidden in the water, rises up from it as the new Kurtz (Marlon Brando), before the assassination scene. Here, the river leads Willard to a place of death and despair, in the final scene it is also Willard’s escape route.

Also in the film, as the men move on the Nung River, Willard and the PBR crew become more agitated and separated from reality. Each man has his own kind of mental breakdown. Chef enters the jungle, has a run-in with a tiger, and is no longer the same. He withdraws deep into drugs. As Pvt. Lance Johnson (Sam Bottoms) turns to drugs too, he also camouflages his face, signaling a changed self. When Clean (Laurence Fishburne) is killed, Chief totally breaks down emotionally. He is not the same. Willard, already broken from his first tour in Vietnam, becomes obsessed with his target. What originally is a mysterious, exciting voyage on the river morphs into a descent into hell. The cinematography is reflecting the madness of war.