Film Review
When Charles Heston carelessly blew up the world in the gripping climax
to
Beneath the Planet of the Apes,
audiences would have had good reason for supposing that that was the
end of the apes saga. But no, by the miracles of modern science
(and a helpful time warp), our favourite chimps, Cornelius and Zira,
pull of the old
Life on Mars
stunt and somehow find their way back to 1973. And a good thing
to, because this is so evidently the best of the sequels to the film
that started it all off,
Planet of the Apes (1968).
Many of the racial and political themes that were explored in the first
Apes film resurface in
Escape from the Planet of the Apes,
although here the situation is cleverly reversed, since it is now man
who is the aggressor, and the apes the victims. The film also
picks up a theme promulgated by the Millennium doom merchants,
who believed that the early 1970s would be when either Christ or the
Anti-Christ would be born, ready to bring about the end of the world in
the Year 2000. Similarities between this film and
The Omen (1976) are apparent, if
you care to look for them.
Escape from the Planet of the Apes
is definitely a film of two halves. It begins in a light-hearted,
almost parodic vein, with much fun being derived from the clash of
cultures that ensues as the apes enjoy their newfound celebrity
status. (If the film had been made today, we would doubtless have
had Cornelius livening things up in the
Big Brother house whilst Zira, the
Princess Di of the chimp world, does the chat show circuit.) The
second half is much darker in tone and reflects the racial paranoia (as
was freely exhibited by the white supremacists) at the time when the
film was made. It is no accident that the villain of the piece, a man
obsessed with racial purity, has a German name (but, mercifully, not a
matching accent). Anyone who is not moved to tears by the fate of
Cornelius and Zira is a heartless fiend who deserves all he gets when
the apes take over.
With an intelligent, meticulously plotted screenplay from Paul Dehn,
Escape from the Planet of the Apes
is both entertaining and thought-provoking. (Several theses have
doubtless been written on the inconsistencies between this and the
previous two films, but we'll gloss over that.) Don Taylor's
effective direction achieves a successful balance of comedy, drama and
adventure and the performances are amongst the best the
Apes series has to offer.
Hoping to make a career comeback, Sal Mineo agreed to appear as the
third ape in the film, Dr Milo, but is not on screen long enough to
have much of an impact.
The film rightly belongs to Roddy McDowall and Kim Hunter, who not only
succeed in making their ape characters human (in the nicest possible
sense of the word), but also give us one of the most believable and
poignant screen romances of all time. This film has the emotional
power of
Bambi and
Brief Encounter combined, and is a
lot funnier. Sadly, this would be Kim Hunter's last appearance in
the
Apes films. Roddy
McDowall would of course return to delight audiences in the following
two sequels and the popular TV series. You just can't keep a good
chimp down.
© James Travers 2009
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.
Film Synopsis
In the early 1970s, a spaceship lands off the coast of California. As a party of US
marines watch in anticipation, three astronauts emerge. They
remove their helmets to reveal that they are not humans, but apes,
humanoid chimpanzees to be precise. These are Cornelius, Zira and
Dr Milo, who managed to escape from their world, two thousand years in
the future, in the very same spaceship that a human astronaut named
Taylor had arrived in. The three apes are taken to Los Angeles
Zoo, to be examined by a team of scientists. Here, Dr Milo is
attacked and killed by a gorilla. Animal psychiatrist Dr Lewis
Dixon is surprised by the apes' obvious intelligence and is even more
astonished when they speak to him in his own language. Summoned
before a Presidential Commission, Zira and Cornelius create a good
impression and are soon feted as celebrities. However, another
scientist, Dr Otto Hasslein, is suspicious about the apes, particularly
when he learns through Zira that the apes are destined to take over
from mankind as the dominant species and then ultimately destroy the
world. When Hasslein discovers that Zira is pregnant, his
concerns turn to paranoia. Unless the unborn ape is destroyed, it
could bring about the extinction of mankind. Dr Hasslein will not
allow that to happen...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.