Planet of the Apes thread

Hahaha. I've had my APES idea in my mind.

A trilogy set in the 21st Century...
DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES
RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES
WAR OF THE PLANET OF THE APES

A trilogy set in the 40th century...
JOURNEY TO THE PLANET OF THE APES
REVOLUTION ON THE PLANET OF THE APES
FALL OF THE PLANET OF THE APES

I think Dawn should be before Rise.

I haven't seen the actual RISE film yet, but my idea for DAWN would be set in 2002 (the Icarus spacecarft having been launched in 2001) and mostly set in somewhere like Cambodia. An American scientist is recruited by some nefarious Evil SF Corporation who has been genetically engineering apes and shit. He goes there, some shit happens, and it's sorta APES meets PREDATOR. It ends with an Ape from the future that we meet in JOURNEY coming back in time in the Icarus (but in secret) and eventually leading the war on humans. And there'd be some ape-generated virus from the future that starts mutating the humans in our present.

JOURNEY would basically be the classic POTA film, but the ape soceity would be more expansive. It would sort of be POTA meets GLADIATOR with Taylor as a Maximus who becomes a Sparticus.

I bought RISE on DVD awhile back when spending my Best Buy gift card, but I'm gonna rewatch the other flicks before I see RISE again.

I think the RISE title was wrong. It should have been DAWN. They don't exactly take over Earth, they become smart and settle in the Muir Woods, where they eventually form their own society and "rise".

Have you seen all of the original movies?

I'll see the Burton one and RISE soon. I've seen the Burton flick twice. I saw it in Chicago when it came out, and then I went to this thing at UCLA and we toured Fox Studios and they screened it for us. So I saw it twice in a few days. Ugh. That was also the trip where I met Heston, but I never made the connection before that I had seen APES and met Heston.

Oh yeah, I hope they make the move at some point in this new series to people in costume. But of course they won't. It would make some sense, though, that these Apes might evolve somewhat quickly. I just don't like the idea of only CGI apes. It sounds like it makes perfect sense for thie most recent movie, but I don't think it's gonna be very interesting in the long run. You can only do so much with CGI apes. Roddy McDowell and Kim Hunter were exceptional actors who made choices and did things in the moment reacting to each other and other actors that just won't work when it's somebody pushing buttons on a computer to generate a performance. Even that Serkis guy running around with motion sensors won't be as good.

Having just seen the Apes movies last week, I watched the first four again this afternoon and evening. It's a bit cool outside today and dreary, and I wasn't feeling well. So I plopped down and watched 'em, and I enjoyed them this time even more. I even tried to watch BATTLE, but shut it off, and it's a totally useless movie. The unrated CONQUEST serves as a satisfactory ending. My rankings remain the same.

1. PLANET OF THE APES (1968)
2. CONQUEST OF THE PLANET OF THE APES
3. ESCAPE FROM THE PLANET OF THE APES
4. BENEATH THE PLANET OF THE APES
5. BATTLE FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES

The first film is a masterpiece. BENEATH is a Star Trek TOS season 3 episode on acid. ESCAPE works very well has a nicely loose quality about it. CONQUEST suffers from a tiny budget and some rather on-the-nose exposition and dialogue, but it's pretty compelling and in the unrated version it's a fitting end. You can shut off your DVD or Blu-ray player right there, or you can watch INEXPLICABLY GRACIOUS CAESER AND HIS BAND OF Z-LIST ACTORS FIGHTS PRE-MUTANT ARMY THAT RIDES IN A SCHOOL BUS AMIDST SOME TREEHOUSES THAT CONSITUTE A CIVILIZATION.

Tis a pity we didn't get Dehn's idea for RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES that would have showcased, I believe, the nuclear war itself. What we get in BATTLE really makes no sense. Though it could be taken as partly a myth as told by the Lawgiver. But stories from someone's imagination usually have a bigger scope and budget.

I'll watch the newer ones tomorrow.

The White Tuxedo wrote:

Have you seen all of the original movies?

Just the first two when I was 12. I remember being hooked watching the first flick, not so much on the second. Never saw the Burton remake.

Oh yeah, and I do remember the Sci-FI channel airing the TV series and how poor it looked compared to the movies.

The TV show looks awful, though it has Mark Lenard as the bad guy, a gorilla.

The White Tuxedo wrote:

The TV show looks awful, though it has Mark Lenard as the bad guy, a gorilla.

I enjoyed it very much (same for NIGHT STALKER and THE BARBARY COAST, all of which were in the same era, reviewed badly and short-lived.) There was one ep where a human and the Lenard character are caught in a cave-in under an old BART station in Frisco. Typical enemies-having-to-work-together thing, with a great moment where General Urko sees an old circus poster of an ape and goes ... well, apeshit. Haven't seen it since first run, but it worked well for me as a teen.

I'm a special kind of masochist because I just watch the extended version of BATTLE. This time I actually paid attention all the way through instead of going on my computer while just having it on.

Yeah, it's bad. It has good intentions, but it doesn't make any sense having Caesar act this way after CONQUEST.

Cor, I remember the series as a kid. It wasn't too shabby (or maybe it was who knows, who cares). Harmless fun in a way. As spin-off to films go it was better than others.

When I was 10 or so, my dad gave me a bunch of Planet of the Apes action figures he had as a kid.

I wish I knew where they are and what they're worth.

Someone should sync this with the construction site chase in CASINO ROYALE.

Like what this guy did.

Control wrote:

When I was 10 or so, my dad gave me a bunch of Planet of the Apes action figures he had as a kid.

I wish I knew where they are and what they're worth.

I have a James T. Kirk figure from the Generations range that I know if it was still in its packaging would be worth a fair chunk. All about the packaging. Though the Apes figures in age alone would surely have some value approaching hefty.

Largo's Shark wrote:

Someone should sync this with the construction site chase in CASINO ROYALE.

Like what this guy did.

Maybe sometime. ;) But I'll make the link private.

Tomorrow I begin my APES run. Looking forward to revisiting the original. Had not seen that or the second since I was a kid. Never saw the rest besides RISE.

Watch "unrated" of CONQUEST. To my knowledge it's just a little extra violence and the original ending. The theatrical ending is most of the same footage, but with new dialogue and a more upbeat ending that comes out of nowhere and doesn't fit with the first 85 minutes.

If you make it through BATTLE, I'll be impressed.

As for ESCAPE, it's good and you'll like the score. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qA5bVjCm-Jc

Uncut is on blu-ray right? I'm renting them as blu.

Yep. Extended BATTLE is also on Blu.

Great line from Battle "Ape shall not kill Ape" Those early ape leaders were deep.

Best line from original Apes, hissed by Heston: " Get your stinking paws off me, you damned dirty ape" A truly iconic moment in cinema.

A friend of mine, uses that line when his kids paw at him. They howl with laughter.

Saw the first flick.

It's as good as I remembered. Just a nice sci-fi/post-apocalyptic flick that made great use of locations and the sets were good. John Landis says it looks to clean in retrospect, maybe, but I see the filmmakers gave the Apes their own unique cultural evolution as a result of man preceding them, leaving leftovers like gun and wheels. Heston is unique as usual. Hard to think of another actor like him. The Ape characters are also given their due that I won't mind missing Heston so much in the sequels. This is surely a film that was made to be the beginning of a series of films. There's so much to explore here it's no surprise it still thrives today even after rough patches throughout the years.

Also. Boy, it looks fantastic on blu-ray, they really did a great job with the transfer. Sometimes it looks like a brand new film at least during the location shoots. About as good as a 40+ year old film can look. I was at first watching it in mono, then I found out it was originally released with a four track stereo, incredible given it came out in 1968. Is the DTS 5.1 mix based on that?

Anyway, I should get the next entry by Friday. I forgot to turn in a disc yesterday so I won't be getting it tomorrow. I'm eager to continue. BENEATH is the only sequel I saw of the original films. I saw it right after the first when I was a kid, but unlike with the original film I can't remember a single thing about the sequel.

I watch them all with the mono audio. That's just me.

With BENEATH I've never liked the idea of the mutants. Enjoy the acid trip.

Off topic, but I imagined that if Kinsey were on MAD MEN and working at the agency in S6 (assuming they reach Feb '68 by then, which I would assume) I would love to see sci-fi fan Kinsey walk into the office, drop to his knees and shout: "GOD DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL!!!!"

Because Netflix has BENEATH under "very long wait", I'll just watch it via iTunes rental then get ESCAPE on blu for Friday viewing.

I'm currently in the middle of the flick. I have no idea where the fuck this movie is going. Taylor vanishes in some rock (???) suddenly we get a some new dude who I call "Bland Taylor" He pretty much repeats everything Heston went through "my god, they're apes!", "you can't talk can you?", "they finally did it!". Fuck this dude, I want more apes action.

I never really chimed in on RISE. It'll be interesting to see if it stands up to a rewatch. It trades in any sense of fun or camp and goes realistic. Oddly, I find some things about the film less believable as a result. By making the story seem more real, the film has less licence in the far out SF department. Also, the world will end because James Franco left the magic potion in his damn fridge.

I'm going to bed. More may come.

Makeshift Python wrote:

Because Netflix has BENEATH under "very long wait", I'll just watch it via iTunes rental then get ESCAPE on blu for Friday viewing.

I'm currently in the middle of the flick. I have no idea where the fuck this movie is going. Taylor vanishes in some rock (???) suddenly we get a some new dude who I call "Bland Taylor" He pretty much repeats everything Heston went through "my god, they're apes!", "you can't talk can you?", "they finally did it!". Fuck this dude, I want more apes action.

Very long wait? Must be all the members the Alpha and Omega United Methodist Church of the Bomb renting it out.

Yeah, James Fran-whatever is pretty dull. He's in this piece of shit, too: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ef9XyGAsl_o

But BENEATH has James Gregory.

I liked some things about it, but found Franco the weakest element. His character should've died at the end to give that "battle" some weight. Otherwise we didn't just watch the "rise" of the planet of the apes, we watched... I dunno, "mild skirmish" of the planet of the apes.

CONQUEST tells essentially the same story, far campier, far less realistic, far less believeable, and far BETTER.

I'd trade any moment in RISE for Caesar's climatic speech in the unedited CONQUEST.

The White Tuxedo wrote:

But BENEATH has James Gregory.

Not enough at this point. Now Bland Taylor is shoving Nova's face in the water. I really am not caring about his story.

Quote :

I liked some things about it, but found Franco the weakest element. His character should've died at the end to give that "battle" some weight. Otherwise we didn't just watch the "rise" of the planet of the apes, we watched... I dunno, "mild skirmish" of the planet of the apes.

Yeah, plus killing Franco would have severed ties for Cesar once and for all, he loses all connection with humanity, the bridge burns (yeah on the nose). I thought making Franco's character unremarkable was so they could really make Cesar the guy everyone rooted for.