One of the few non-Biblical epics from gun crazed conservative actor Charlton Heston, the classic sci-fi tale Planet of the Apes has carried on throughout the decades, followed by four sequels and managing a 2001 remake from the master of wackiness, Tim Burton. Even someone like myself has to enjoy this film, even though it doesn't exactly match the book word-for-word. Then again, at that stage of the cinematic timeline, it wasn't exactly financially possible to pull off the futuristic ape society described in the pages of the Pierre Boulle novel, "Monkey Planet", so we can forgive them. Besides, I think the movie works well in the range it's given, and it's proven itself to be steady entertainment, even now, over 30 years following it's birth. Not really a big surprise though, considering it was adapted for the screen by Michael Wilson (Lawrence of Arabia) and Rod "the 'Zone man" Serling! The Jerry Goldsmith soundtrack also lifts the film up immensely, especially during the classic "hunt of the humans" scene! Plus, I went into it with an anti-monkey, anti-Heston frame of mind, so you KNOW it has to be good, even to garner a four smiley face rating! Enough talk though, let's get down to business.

Chuck Heston plays George Taylor (I could make SO many Curious George jokes.... but I won't): an American asshole-naut (he's a space-faring jerk) who, along with two other guys and a woman, have been launched into space for some reason. Traveling through the void of space for 6 months at lightspeed, the group has actually gone 700 Earth years into the future... and none of them look a day over 30! Anyway, now it's time for them to head back to Earth and see if it's become the automated Shangri-La of "The Jetsons" or the vehicular nightmare of The Road Warrior... or one of the many Mad Max rip-offs for that matter. However, while still in suspended animation, the crew's ship makes a water landing on what's supposed to be Earth. This is odd, considering the ship was supposed to land on solid ground... and we all know how the Earth's surface DOESN'T CHANGE AT ALL over the course of 700 years! Also, just because they can breathe the atmosphere, that's no reason to think it's Earth! Note the heavy sarcasm here by yours truly. Anyway, that's not the only problem for our boys, as it appears the only female in the group was snoozing in a faulty suspension tube. The glass busted and, without proper sealant and pressure, the babe just aged like normal. However since she had the sleep serum still in her body, she never even knew what was going on, and just decayed away until she mummified... eww, looks like the new generation of Earth is gonna be short-lived and gay! Well guys, better learn to love each other soon. I just hope they packed plenty of Vaseline...

Upon exiting the ship and rowing their emergency raft to dry land, our three spacemen make another discovery: turns out the white coats back in their time made a calculation mistake, and they're actually 2000 years into the future, NOT 700! Damn, Chuck Heston really IS one old motherfucker! Oh, and again, we all know that the face of the Earth can't change at all in the span of 2 FRIGGIN' MILLENNIA! Once again, added sarcasm. After several days of trekking through desert wasteland and Taylor being a dickhead jock and picking on London, the trio's science nerd, the guys finally find plant life! They also find a water source where they can drink and bath (ewww! naked old man asses!) and wash their lice infested beards out. However, there's one thing that doesn't seem like a good discovery: frightening looking scarecrow thingies! Then again, they find some human footprints in the mud, so now they know that at least they're not alone! And if they're lucky, there might even be some FEMALE humans in the lot! Wahoo! The next generation might not be so homosexual and short-lived after all! Besides, the thought of Heston taking it in the ass and clenching his teeth in the moment frightens me more than you could ever imagine...

When they do meet these primitive humans, they find them to be none-too-smart. Being the typical man amongst the three star travelers, Taylor looks at this as the opportunity to rule over these primitive screwheads like a God! Or at least like a royal figure of some kind! Well Taylor, I'm afraid your dreams of lording over Neanderthals are not to be, as a posse of gorillas on horseback already lay claim to your loyal subjects! Capturing many of the dirty savages and killing others, the rifle wielding chimps clip Taylor in the throat and trap him in a net. Then they collect their trophies, take a few snapshots for their ape hunting magazines, gather their day's catch and head back to monkey town... it's kinda ironic to see the president of the NRA at the business end of the the guns he loves so much! Ah, the misfortune of others brings such joy to me. Taylor winds up in the pens of the monkey scientists, who experiment on our hero and his fellow homo-sapiens in an effort to find out more about them. Since all the other humans can just grunt and fart, Taylor would be quite the sideshow attraction since he can speak the language of the monkeys (who all happen to speak English... again, NO WAY this could be Earth!)! But, thanx to that gunshot to the throat, Taylor can't say a word... yet. Female ape psychologist Dr. Zira feels that Taylor, or "Bright Eyes" as she calls him, is far more advanced than the other hairless apes (i.e. humans, not literal bald apes), by the way he moves his lips and tries to sign his intelligence. Head science monkey Dr Zaius ("Help me Dr. Zaius! Dr. Zaius, Dr. Zaius!"), however, feels Taylor's actions are simple mimicry of his simian captors and nothing more. Boy is his snide ass in for a surprise!

On the plus side for Taylor, at least he gets his choice of prime cavewoman pussy! Then again, no matter how hot she may look under the dirt and filth, she's still, well, dirty and filthy. Who knows what she's got crawling around down i her cracks and crevices... *BARF*! Speaking of which, I wonder what ever became of AIDS in the future... Anyway, supporting Zira's claims is archaeologist monkey (and Zira's fiance) Cornelius (Roddy McDowall in his career making role) who believes his blushing poop-flinger to be, though he's not TOO supportive, since such heresy could cost him his position as chief archeological muckity-muck. Taylor makes a smart move though, when he grabs a notepad and pencil from Zira when she gets too close to his cage. Before a guard gorilla comes in an beats the shit out of him (he must be in the Ape version of LA) he manages to scribble out "My name is Taylor". Lucky for Taylor that, not only do the fleabags speak English, but they also write and read it... though I like this movie, you can see the parts that took away that last smiley face for. When they take him out to examine him in a more comfortable environment, he wows them with more writings and the startling phenomena of paper airplanes... THESE GUYS ARE IMPRESSED BY PAPER AIRPLANES?! Hah! Guess these chimps aren't as advanced creatures as they think they are. These signs of advanced intelligence (at least compared to the pit sniffing ass scratchers that he's being categorized with) shown by Taylor help support Cornelius's Darwinian Theory that apes actually evolved from a lower species, in this case man. So, oddly enough, Taylor just may be the missing link! But, Dr. Zaius (who definitely knows more than he lets on in his cinematic villain way) doesn't like this kind of talk, since it's heresy to think in a way that speaks against the ape laws.

To help enforce the ape laws and keep Taylor from mating and to dissuade him from trying to communicate anymore, Zaius orders "Bright Eyes" castrated! Proud of his penis and not happy about the idea of losing, Taylor decides that escape is now or never! However, in spite of his best efforts, Taylor is recaptured. Lucky for him though that, before he loses his three best friends in the world, he discovers his throat's healed enough that he can shout the now immortal words, "Take your stinking paws off me you damn, dirty ape!". The simians are understandably stunned and now Taylor can talk to himself in the afterglow about how old Earth wasn't so bad after all. Great, that's just what we needed, Charlton Heston talking to himself... I think I liked it better when he couldn't do anything but wave his arms and get his ass kicked. I mean, for the next few minutes following his miraculous healing, it turns into one big Heston monologue, which is only made worse by his over dramatic tone. This goes downhill quickly until he's finally separated from his barbarous babe toy and he's brought before the tribunal. The tribunal consists solely of snobby Orangutans, the "high class" tick harvesters. See, even on The Planet of the Apes there's the universal class struggle. I think the chimpanzees are on the bottom, topped by the chimpan-A's, then the gorillas and finally the majestic Orangutans. As for the rosy assed baboons, they were probably exiled for their nefarious dung flinging and constant mooning of the other apes. I remember my first exile...

Anyway, those stuck up Tribunal assholes shoot down any claims that Taylor is an evolved human and instead claim he's some perverse science experiment by Zira. You know, like that four-assed human she bio-engineered. And let's not forget her FIVE-assed human either... sick weirdo Dr. Zira. The only support to Taylor's claims of coming from space is his pal London, who was also captured by the apes. This is only a temporary possibility though; cuz when they bring London in front of the tribunal, Taylor finds that he's been lobotomized! Yes, that asshole Zaius got to him first and chopped up his mind. Now it looks like Taylor's screwed thanx to simian prejudice... serves ya right Heston, you conservative dunder pate! Heh heh, "dunder pate". So, despite their best efforts, Zira and Cornelius are stripped of their stations in life and labeled heretics. As for Taylor, he's ordered a living death in the form of dissection and experimentation! The following night however, with the help of Cornelius, Zira and Zira's nephew Lucius, Taylor and his "lower on the evolutionary ladder" girlfriend Nova (a name chosen by Taylor, who must've been a hippy before becoming a republican, and still lets his "love child" side out when it can help him score with big titted liberals) manage to escape under cover of night. Not exactly a surprise since he's being played by you-know-who, the first thing Taylor does with his new freedom is demand a gun... man, this movie's even better now that Heston's the NRA's God!

The group finally reaches one of Cornelius's old dig sites on a beach near a body of water, possibly an ocean. But, smooth sailing is a fantasy, as the monkey secret police arrive with Dr. Zaius to reclaim his guinea pig. However, Dr. Zaius gets a little too close to the action, like snobbish feebs like him usually do, and Taylor grabs his for use as a hostage. With him at the end of Taylor's gun, the group drags him into Cornelius's diggin cave to show him evidence that, yes, humans were here BEFORE the apes, no matter what their monkey bible may say. And the evidence that there's been other advanced cultures and civilizations on Ape Planet? A doll. Yes, a 2000 year old doll that whines when you squeeze it... that's the evidence that's supposed to prove humans were here first. Actually, ape children have dolls of humans too, so it's not the doll really that's the proof, but since humans of this age don't make sounds, then it's the fact that this doll makes a noise that convinces Dr. Zaius. However, though this proves that humans were here first, it doesn't disprove ape belief that humans are still harbingers of the apocalypse! Boy are they ever right.

So, using Dr. Zaius's life as a bargaining chip, Taylor demands food and supplies and horses for him and Nova. When they get their ransom, the happy couple scampers off to rebuild a civilization of smart humans. As for the cave, well, Dr. Z orders it destroyed to preserve the current way of ape life by refusing their fellow monkeys the knowledge of their true history. As for Cornelius and Zira, they'll be granted pardons for their heresy and allowed to live amongst their fellow flea circuses as long as they keep their mouths shut... or they go to ape prison for a year... or are exiled, I don't remember which. As for Taylor, if you think his life ends up happily ever after, well, you're wrong, because he discovers something soon after he and Nova escape: the blowed up remains of the Statue of Liberty! Yes, in case you didn't pick it up from all the hints spread throughout the film, THE PLANET OF THE APES is really Earth around the year 3970... if you didn't pick that up (or learn it from stories told of the ending over the decades since it's creation) then you are SUCH a JACKASS! Heston then pulls his trademark "Damn you all to Hell!" shpiel and we end on an awkward note.

As you can guess by my review, I wasn't too keen o the coincidence that the apes all spoke, wrote and read English. If they want to back that info up with some recap, I'm all for it, but just telling me that English happened to turn out the dominant language? WRONG! And you're telling me it took Taylor the ENTIRE movie to figure out he was on Earth the whole time?! Well, maybe it's just me, but after being able to breathe the atmosphere, I think I'd have picked up on that little tidbit INSTANTLY! Not to toot my own horn, you know my self-esteem is almost nothing; I just don't consider myself a complete and total ASS! Also, far be it from me, as a diety who wastes his free time on a website, to judge, but for supposedly hailing from at least three different species, didn't all these "apes" look a little TOO similar? I mean, they're different classes of mammals, yet they all evolve into the same final stage? Were that true, the humans would've been the EXACT same... I think. Fuck this, I'm getting a headache!

Either way, the movie was good. Well directed, good make-up FX (even in spite of the whole "they all look the same" problem), great acting considering everyone had to speak past the make-up. Hell, even that old bastard Heston did well... when he wasn't speaking! Yeah, though I don't like his verbal acting, he did well conveying his pain and desperation WITHOUT words. Kinda like how Arnold Schwarzenegger and Mike Tyson are very physical presences... until they open their mouths! Also, the film had good moments of ironic and intentional comedy. Aside from the amusing parallels between some of Heston's scenes and his NRA status today, I was also laughing my hairy ass off to the tribunal scene, in which the members do the whole "see no evil, speak no evil, hear no evil" act! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH! THOSE WACKY MONKEYS! Oh man, that's priceless. Aside from all that crap, I was also intrigued by the monkey hierarchy situation. Though they're boring in real life, politics can be cool in situations like this! So, get out and vote kids! :-D

Sequels: Beneath the Planet of the Apes, Escape From the Planet of the Apes, Conquest of the Planet of the Apes and Battle for the Planet of the Apes