Review #1,479: 'Planet of the Apes' (1968)

"You maniacs! You blew it all up! God damn you all to hell!" The image of the sweaty, bare-chested Charlton Heston beating the floor as the truth finally hits home at the climax of Planet of the Apes is now one of the most iconic moments in cinema history. If you saw the film as a kid, chances are this will be the scene you'll remember, or the famous "Take your stinking paws off me you damn dirty ape!" line, as Heston's fallen astronaut George Taylor reveals himself as an intelligent being to his simian captors. It's been lovingly parodied through the subsequent decades, and its memory somewhat tarnished by Tim Burton's abysmal 2001 remake, so it's easy to forget just how revolutionary Franklin J. Schaffner's film was for mainstream science-fiction cinema, and just how much it has inspired the genre with its legacy ever since.

Astronauts Taylor, Landon (Robert Gunner) and Dodge (Jeff Burton) rest in deep hibernation as their spaceship speeds through the galaxy at light-speed. While the crew have aged just over a year, by the time the craft crashes down on a strange, but seemingly habitable, planet, two thousand years have gone by back on Earth. With no hope in sight, the three space travellers decide to trudge through the deserts of this unknown rock and eventually come across fresh water, stopping for a well-earned bathe despite the ominous presence of crude scarecrows looming over them. When their clothes are stolen, they encounter what appears to be a community of humans, only these are dressed in rags and don't communicate verbally. Out of nowhere, they are raided by figures on horseback, who hunt the fleeing humans to either kill or capture them. The aggressors are rifle-wielding gorillas wearing armour, and Taylor and Landon are ensnared and carried off to Ape City to be studied and experimented on by an intelligent ape society.

While it's easy to get caught up in all the action and adventure, it's the social, political and religious observations that will stay with you long after the credits have rolled. Planet of the Apes is the stuff of truly great science-fiction, a genre that allows us to be whisked off to a different time or space that feels oddly close to home. Schaffner's film paints a pretty pessimistic picture of humanity, as Taylor, prior to hibernation, ponders the planet he thinks he'll eventually return to, and whether humanity will have moved on from the conflict-ridden world he was eager to leave behind. The world he is eventually plunged into is much like our own, or is certainly heading that way. Taylor is viewed as a threat, foretold in ancient religious texts that sound suspiciously like our own, while blinkered scientist Dr. Zaius (Maurice Evans) dismisses the idea of evolution despite the pleas of psychologist Zira (Kim Hunter) and her fiance Cornelius (Roddy McDowall). The Oscar-winning make-up is also staggering, standing shoulder to shoulder with anything from the modern era. More than fifty years after its release, Planet of the Apes is better, and sadly more relevant, than ever. There's a reason this story is still being told.


Directed by: Franklin J. Schaffner
Starring: Charlton Heston, Roddy McDowall, Kim Hunter, Maurice Evans, James Whitmore, Linda Harrison
Country: USA

Rating: *****

Tom Gillespie

Review #915: 'Bowling for Columbine' (2002)

In the wake of the recent shootings in Virginia by a masked gunman live on air and the seemingly endless mass killings in America taking place in schools, movie theatres and churches, it seemed like the perfect time to re-visit Bowling for Columbine, Michael Moore's breakthrough documentary on gun violence in America. It has been 16 years since the massacre of 12 students and 1 teacher at Columbine High School in Columbine, Colorado, and 13 years since Michael Moore won the Best Documentary Oscar for his extremely provocative and shocking film. The main question is has anything changed? The answer is a resounding no. In fact, gun violence seems more out of control than ever.

Starting out tongue-in-cheek, Bowling for Columbine begins by telling a few amusing, almost too-ridiculous-to-be-true anecdotes highlighting America's love of guns. Moore opens an account in a bank, only to be rewarded with a rifle for doing so. and begging the question of just how sensible it is to be handing out guns in a bank. We then learn of a couple of men who thought it would be funny to dress up their dog in hunting gear with a rifle strapped to it's back, only for the gun to fall off and shoot one of them in the leg. These early moments are hilarious as Moore interviews the type of crazy-haired lunatics who should have their own soundtrack of twanging banjos, but serve to set up the audience for something more serious and all the more troubling.

Is America's violent history to blame for the amount of gun deaths that occur every year? Most large countries, such as Britain, Germany and Japan, were built on bloodshed and have committed recent atrocities. Is America's love of guns as a way of life the reason for so much violence? Canada is also a gun-loving nation of hunters, but Canadian's leave their doors unlocked when they leave their home. Is it the poverty and mass unemployment? Nope - check out almost any other country with the same social issues but without the same levels of crime. It's when Moore takes a trip across the water to Canada that he seems to have the revelation. He catches a clip of the news, where the breaking story is the introduction of speed bumps. These people weren't being drilled with fear 24/7. Switch on the news in America, and you see young black males being chased down, arrested, and thrown into the back of a police car, or as interviewee Marilyn Manson points out, there are adverts telling you that if you don't brush with Colgate, you'll have bad breath and no-one with come near you.

For the majority of Bowling for Columbine, Michael Moore raises some terrifying questions and makes many very good points, all delivered with powerful, ironic montage's, insightful interviews, and a wry humour. But the last quarter descends into a Moore vanity piece, as he puts himself in front of the camera when he should remain behind it. Moore takes a couple of Columbine's survivors to Walmart to campaign against their sale of bullets and brings the press with him. Although it gets the job done, Moore's ever-presence as a kind of working man's hero makes it come across as a cheap publicity stunt. There's also the climactic interview with NRA president Charlton Heston, who Moore lures in under false pretences and then ambushes with questions of gun-control, a tactic that crosses any journalistic boundaries into sheer rudeness and left me uncomfortable. However, Bowling for Columbine is still an extremely powerful film, and is still shockingly relevant over a decade later. Every week, the news seems to deliver a story about yet another massacre and yet a lot of American's still argue that guns are important for self-defence, which is an extremely depressing thought indeed.


Directed by: Michael Moore
Starring: Michael Moore, Charlton Heston
Country: Canada/USA/Germany

Rating: ****

Tom Gillespie

Review #200: 'Beneath the Planet of the Apes' (1970)

With the recent release of franchise re-booter Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes (2011), it seemed like a good time to re-visit the sequels to the original Planet Of The Apes (1968) film. The original is enormously popular even now and contains many popular quotes, but the sequels I can remember little of. I watched them as a child, but cannot recall which ones I saw and even if I saw them in order. This is the first sequel, and carries on immediately after we watched Charlton Heston on his knees in front of the half-buried Statue of Liberty at the end of the first.

Taylor (Charlton Heston) rides off on his horse with mute simpleton (and co-incidentally beautiful) Nova (Linda Harrison). When being met by a giant wall of fire, Taylor goes to check it out only to disappear into the side of the mountain. Meanwhile, an astronaut on a rescue mission who has followed Taylor's path, John Brent (James Franciscus), has crashed on the ape-ruled planet, and discovers the apes plans to march on a mysterious underground city they believe may be run by humans. With the help of friendly ape Zira (Kim Hunter), he gets there first along with Nova, only to discover it is run by strange telekinetic humans in crap costumes that worship their God - a nuclear bomb.

While this was a perfect opportunity to develop and enlarge the franchise's mythology, the decision to introduce the mind-reading humans was a bad one. The best thing about the original was the role-reversal of the apes and humans, the former being vastly intelligent and powerful while the latter being silent and enslaved. The humans in there cheap-looking futuristic costumes and rather silly abilities, clash with the original's ideals. And the fact that so little action is focused on the apes takes the magic out of it. Though Heston does appear in what could be called an extended cameo, new lead Franciscus is simply a bland carbon-copy of Taylor's character and does not share the acting chops and gravel-faced talents of Heston. Franciscus would spend the majority of his career starring in Italian giallo films, namely Argento's The Cat O' Nine Tales (1971).

When I was ready to completely write the film off, however, then came the completely depressing and quite shocking ending, which certainly bumped the film up a few notches for me. But apart from that, the film is rather bland, silly, and does nothing to extend or improve upon the original, which still remains a very solid sci-fi film.


Directed by: Ted Post
Starring: James Franciscus, Kim Hunter, Linda Harrison, Maurice Evans, Charlton Heston
Country: USA

Rating: ***

Tom Gillespie