Time Capsule – Don’t Forget The Apes – Planet Of The Apes Retrospective

Don’t forget the apes

The 1960’s were a golden age for cinema.

There was such great cinematic classics such as 2001, The Graduate and of course Mary Poppins. The decade also saw the release of what I consider the most important sci-fi film ever released. Planet of the Apes!

The story of the film starts in France in 1963. Pierre Boulle a French novelist who had previously written the classic ‘The Bridge over the River Kwai’ published a novel entitled ‘La Planete des singes’ or ‘Planet of the Apes.’ It wasn’t for another five years that the film that would finally be seen in the cinema. By the time the film hit the silver screen it had deviated quite dramatically from the novel.

The film starred Charlton Heston in the lead role as Taylor as well as Roddy McDowall as the ape scientist Cornelius. While I don’t want to go into the plot of the film too greatly just in case you haven’t seen it, it’s essentially a case of modern day man ends up on a planet run by intelligent apes.

Under the direction of Franklin Schaffner the movie is simply a beautiful film to watch. The prosthetics used by make-up artist John Chambers was considered ground-breaking at the time and even led to him picking up an honorary academy award for outstanding makeup achievement. Much of the film was shot near the Grand Canyon in Arizona. The final beach scene was filmed in such a secluded area everything had to be flown in by helicopter.

One of the aspects of the film that people remember is the twist at the end of the film. Personally I think the ending takes what would have been an already great film and makes it a total classic.

The film’s release coincided with the Civil Rights Act of 1968. Civil rights and equality were a hot topic of the day and it’s unclear whether Charlton Heston, a known supporter of the civil rights movement, choose to take the role with the films political message in mind.

The films political message is not the reason I think that Planet of the Apes is such an important film. This film made enough money and gained a large enough following to persuade Hollywood to make a sequel. The first film quickly led to four more ‘ape’ flicks as well as a television series, comic books and toys.

While all this seems commonplace now, it wasn’t back then.

Planet of the Apes made a lot of money for Hollywood and proved to them that a Sci-fi franchise could work, paving the way for some great movie franchises in the future.

Can you imagine where we would be without the ‘apes?’

Scary thought, almost as scary as the thought of apes overrunning the planet!

It would be impossible to write this without talking about Tim Burton’s 2001 reboot staring Mark Wahlberg. While an alright film, it’s not really a patch on the original.

Maybe sometimes you don’t need a reboot, I mean God forbid anyone ever tries to reboot Star Wars.

Buy It Here>>
Planet Of The Apes [DVD] [1968]

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IJS1BY7V2Y