The basis for Apocalypse Now; this is the story of an English steamboat captain going up a river in Africa in the service of a Belgian trading company to the ivory outpost controlled by a man named Kurtz. The contrast of various types of insanity is the core theme of the story comparing the "civilized" mistreatment of the natives at the hands of the company with the "uncivilized" mistreatment by Mr Kurtz.
Now for the blasphemy; Stanley Kubrik totally outdid Joseph Conrad. this may not be a question of skill but rather a change in the disposition of the readers in the early twentieth century versus the viewers in the latter half of the same. While Mr Conrad's depictions were certainly unpleasant by modern standards, they may just not feel as horrific as they once seemed.
