Planet of the Apes | |
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Directed by | Franklin J. Schaffner |
Produced by | Mort Abraham Arthur P. Jacobs |
Written by | Novel: Pierre Boulle Screenplay: Michael Wilson Rod Serling |
Starring | Charlton Heston Roddy McDowall Kim Hunter Maurice Evans James Whitmore James Daly Linda Harrison Brady Johnston |
Music by | Jerry Goldsmith |
Distributed by | 20th Century Fox |
Release date(s) | ![]() |
Running time | 112 min |
Country | ![]() |
Language | English |
Budget | $5,800,000 |
Followed by | Beneath the Planet of the Apes |
Planet of the Apes is a 1968 science fiction/thriller film directed by Franklin J. Schaffner loosely based on the novel La planète des singes by Pierre Boulle. The film stars Charlton Heston, Roddy McDowall, Kim Hunter and veteran Shakespearean actor Maurice Evans. The film was ground-breaking for its make-up techniques by artist John Chambers.[1] The script was originally written by Rod Serling but had many rewrites before eventually being made.[2] Changes included character names and a more primitive ape society, instead of the more expensive idea of having futuristic buildings and advanced technology.[3]
The film was well received by critics and audiences, launching a film franchise,[4] including four sequels, as well as a short lived television show, animated series, comic books, various merchandising, and eventually a remake in 2001. McDowall had a long-running relationship with the Apes series, appearing in the original series of five films (one only via stock footage from an earlier film), and also in the television series.
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Astronauts Taylor, Landon, and Dodge are in deep hibernation when their spaceship (non-canonically known as Icarus) crash-lands in a lake on an unknown planet in 3978 after a 2006-year voyage at near-light speed (the crew ages only 18 months due to time dilation). The astronauts awaken to find that their fourth companion and only female, Stewart, has died in space due to an air leak and that their ship is sinking. They use an inflatable raft to reach shore. Once there, Dodge performs a soil test and pronounces the soil incapable of sustaining life. Taylor suggests they are on a planet in the constellation of Orion some 320 light years from Earth but admits he is not sure.
The three astronauts set off through the desert, finding first a single plant and then others. They find an oasis at the edge of the desert where they decide to take a swim, ignoring strange 'scarecrows'. While they are swimming, their clothes are stolen. Pursuing the thieves, the astronauts find their clothes in shreds and the perpetrators — a group of mute, primitive humans — contentedly raiding a cornfield. But shortly, the astronauts and other humans are being pursued by gorillas on horseback. Dodge is shot and killed during the pursuit, while Taylor and Landon are captured and taken back to Ape City; Taylor is shot in the throat, but survives due to the surgical efforts of two chimpanzee scientists, Zira and Galen. Upon his recovery, Taylor is put in a cage with a woman, Nova, who was captured on the same hunt. Due to the throat injury, he has temporarily lost his ability to speak.
Taylor discovers that the apes, who can talk, are in control and are divided into a strict class system: the gorillas as police, military, and hunters; the orangutans as administrators, politicians and lawyers; and the chimpanzees as intellectuals and scientists. Humans, who cannot talk, are considered feral vermin and are hunted and used for scientific experimentation.
Zira and her fiancé, Cornelius, an archaeologist, take an interest in Taylor because of his lip movements. While Cornelius and Zira are talking to their boss, Dr. Zaius, Taylor writes in the dirt and attempts to call Cornelius and Zira's attention to it, but he becomes frustrated when they do not notice the writing. Zaius sees some letters on the dirt and realizes that Taylor possesses intelligence and hastily erases the letters with his cane. Taylor manages to steal paper and a pencil from Zira and convinces her and Cornelius that he is intelligent.
Zaius orders Taylor to be gelded (emasculated), but he makes an escape. Running through the ape city Taylor discovers the stuffed remains of astronaut Dodge on exhibit in a museum. He is recaptured and while hanging in a net stuns the crowd by speaking, shouting the famous line, "Take your stinking paws off me, you damn dirty ape!" He is put on trial to determine his origins (in a parody of the Scopes Monkey trial). During the trial, he is treated like a beast with little or no rights. During the trial Taylor talks about his comrades and explains that one was killed and the other lost. At this point the court is directed to a group of humans that were captured at the same time as Taylor where he sees Landon, who has been lobotomized. Landon isn't seen again but the sequel Beneath the Planet of the Apes revealed that he was killed.
Later, Taylor is taken to see Dr. Zaius, who threatens to lobotomize him as well if he doesn't tell the "truth" about where he came from. But Cornelius and Zira execute a plan to free Taylor, who insists that Nova also be brought along. They flee to the Forbidden Zone, where, a year earlier, Cornelius had discovered a cave with artifacts of an advanced society. Dr. Zaius, along with a band of gorilla soldiers, manages to find them. After a struggle, Taylor finds a talking human doll in the cave that proves that intelligent humans were on the planet long before the apes gained control. Taylor and Nova are allowed to escape on horseback. Zaius lets them go without further confrontation, knowing that Taylor will find "his destiny." After they leave, Zaius has the soldiers blow up the cave to prevent future research.
Soon after his escape, in the final, iconic scene, Taylor discovers a damaged Statue of Liberty half-buried in the beach. He realizes that he has been on Earth all along, and that humanity must have destroyed its own civilization with war, thereby paving the way for the Planet of the Apes.
In the late 1960s most studios were not convinced that this film was a feasible production. One script that came close to being made was written by Rod Serling, though it was finally rejected for a number of reasons. A prime concern was cost, as the technologically advanced ape society portrayed by Serling's script would have involved expensive sets, props and special effects. Serling's script was rewritten and the ape society made more primitive as way of eliminating many costly sets and special effects. His ending was retained, however, leading to one of the most famous movie endings of all time. The exact location and state of decay of the Statue of Liberty (as seen in the 1998 documentary Behind the Planet of the Apes) changed over several storyboards. One version depicted the statue buried up to its nose in the middle of a jungle while another depicted the statue in pieces.
In order to convince the Fox Studio that a Planet of the Apes film could really be made, the producers shot a brief test scene using early versions of the ape makeup. Charlton Heston appeared as an early version of Taylor (named Thomas, as he was in Rod Serling-penned drafts of the script), Edward G. Robinson appeared as Zaius, while then-unknown actors James Brolin and Linda Harrison played Cornelius and Zira. Harrison, who was the mistress of the head of the studio at the time, would later play Nova in the 1968 film and its first sequel, and have a cameo in the Tim Burton "reimagining" more than 30 years later (as did Heston). This test footage is included on several DVD releases of the film, as well as the documentary Behind the Planet of the Apes. Dr. Zaius was originally to have been played by Robinson, but he backed out due to the heavy make-up, and long sessions to apply it, that were required. (Robinson later made his final film, Soylent Green, opposite his one-time Ten Commandments co-star Heston.)
Shooting began on May 21, 1967, and ended on August 10, 1967. Most of the first scenes in the film were shot at Lake Powell and Glen Canyon located in Utah, as well as locations near Page, Arizona. The scenes of the crew paddling away from their crashed ship were shot on Lake Powell. The ape village was constructed and filmed on the Fox Ranch in Malibu Creek State Park, northwest of Los Angeles. The concluding beach scenes, including the remains of the Statue of Liberty, were shot near Point Dume, at the south end of Zuma Beach in Malibu.[5]
Award | Person | |
Honorary Award for outstanding achievement in Makeup in the movie | John Chambers | |
Nominations | ||
Best Costume Design | Morton Haack | |
Best Score | Jerry Goldsmith |
It won an honorary Academy Award for John Chambers for his outstanding make-up achievement. It was nominated for Best Costume Design (Morton Haack) and Best Original Score for a Motion Picture (not a Musical). The score is known for its avant-garde compositional techniques, as well as the use of unusual percussion instruments and extended performance techniques.
The movie is on several of the AFI lists but did not make the top 100 movies either time. However, the musical score by Jerry Goldsmith was picked as the 18th best film score in American Cinema according to AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores. Also according to the American Film Institute, it contains the 66th best movie line: "Take your stinking paws off me you damn dirty ape!" The film is also ranked at #59 on the AFI's 100 Years... 100 Thrills list.
In 2001, Planet of the Apes was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". Ironically, this was the same year the critically savaged "reimagining" was released.
The surprise ending in the film's final scene frequently makes "best moments in film" and "best endings" lists.
Planet of the Apes was followed by four sequels:
and two short-lived television series:
The movie was "reimagined" in 2001; see Planet of the Apes (2001 film).
Marvel Comics produced full comic book adaptations of all the films, a number of original stories in the Apes universe, including Terror On The Planet Of The Apes, Future History Chronicles and others.
The film deviated from the original French novel in a number of ways:
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