Ape Chronicles #045 - Hunter's Planet of the Apes Archive

APE CHRONICLES
International
PLANET OF THE APES
Fan Club
HOKNES@HOTMAIL.COM
PlanetOfTheApesFanClub.com
Issue #45
May 2009
President of the
International POTA Fan Club
Publisher / Editor / Head-Writer
Terry Hoknes
739 Taylor Street East
Saskatoon, SK Canada
S7H 1W1 (306) 270-9387
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Ape Chronicles is the bi-monthly
magazine for the International
Planet Of The Apes Fan Club
formed to promote POTA
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Some info reprinted from Internet Sites
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"POTA : More than 40
Years On"
by Jeff Krueger
"POTA was one of the 1968 films that
made that year a turning point both
for the increasing maturity of SF
cinema and for it's popularity".
- - - "Encyclopedia of Science Fiction"
(Clute/Nicholls, 1993)
So, what do we have to celebrate
after 40 years of the original "Planet
of the Apes" movie and it's progeny
Just as there were many minds at
work in creating it, there's just as
many opinions on it's impact, it's
aesthetic value, and even if it's cooler
than "Star Wars". It's impossible to
sum it up for everyone. There's a lot
of social content in there, but for
those who just love seeing apes on
horseback it might seem pretentious
to examine that. For those who like to
dissect...dissect...dissect the political
implications, it's just uncouth to
celebrate it as a "camp classic" and
give Charlton Heston the 1968 Ham
of the Year Award. Not to mention the
wide variety of opinion on it's sequels,
TV shows, merchandising, remakes
and the analysis that has been written
about it for 4 decades. So I'm here
just to give my take on it. And maybe
it's your take too.
It's all been said before. How it was a
movie no studio wanted to make. How
it transcended the science fiction
ghetto of the time to open the door
(along with "Star Trek" and "2001") for
a new era where science fiction
wasn't just kids' stuff but a star
attraction in it's own right ("A" movies
instead of "B" movies). How it was a
groundbreaker in movie
merchandising. And how the studio
that had to have it's arm twisted to
make it has looked at it cynically for 4
decades instead of allowing it to
flourish creatively.
POTA showed science fiction and
fantasy could reach a wider audience
with quality production value and
imaginitive writing, just as rare movies
like "Frankenstein", "King Kong",
"Forbidden Planet" and "The Day the
Earth Stood Still" had done in the
past. It took visionaries (like Arthur
Jacobs) to escort these to completion.
Some might not see the distinction
but those movies continue to enthrall
audiences, not just because they had
decent budgets or good FX. They had
terrific scripts and ideas that had a
point besides "get to the monster".
That's always been a problem for
SF/fantasy movies. If it's not set in a
courtroom or on a battlefield, it's not a
serious movie (though POTA has it's
share of courtrooms and battlefields).
Ultimately any subject can make a
good/great movie, if the script is up to
the task and the people sheparding
that script can stay true to it. Secondguessing
the audience (will they
laugh at the makeup) is always a
problem.
Of course, not all good movies find
their audience. I think the ones that
do usually deliver the goods as well
as the content. POTA DID give us the
monster, DID give us the chases, DID
give us the spaceship, but it wasn't
afraid to give us a little more.
For me the political and social content
will always be special. As a kid, the
science fiction trappings were the
key, but I still responded to the story.
As I got older and learned more of the
world, my appreciation of the POTA
concept deepened. I learned about
religious hypocrisy, the use of
"otherness" to scapegoat a people (in
this case literally), how dogmas are
used to keep societies at bay. And
especially, how it's up to individuals to
make the important changes, to say
"No". The primary POTA story
template is a citizen assisting the
outsider. That's a story that was
compelling as a kid, but as I learned
more of the world and it's history the
stories became even more potent. As
I like to say, the older I get the more
relevant POTA seems.
That's POTA's significance 40 years
later to me. It encapsulates the woes
of our interactions and gives meaning
in a world that sometimes seems like
it will never come out of the darkness
(maybe that's the essence of any
good story). By making it ape vs.
human it removes us a step and
shows how ridiculous our prejudices,
dogmas and religious intolerances
are. At the same time there's
something organic to the conflict
because of the real world relationship
between apes and humans. The ape
element deflates our pretensions.
There's a different texture than there
would be if it were space aliens or
blobs from the sewer. POTA has
always grabbed me in a unique way.
For those who just enjoy it for the
"Take your stinking paws off me"
moments, that's fine, too. POTA
delivers the goods. There's no
mandatory way to enjoy POTA. The
only thing that's obvious after 40
years is that people have enjoyed it.
What more can you ask of a movie