“Take your stinking paws off me”: what is the best ‘Planet of the Apes’ movie?
For over 50 years, Planet of the Apes has remained one of the most well-known franchises in sci-fi cinema, and it’s fair to say a lot of its reputation stems directly from the impact of the original.
After all, the series would never reach the same heights again until the recent reboots began rolling out, and part of the reason why the far-flung saga retained so much interest was because of the Academy Award-winning visual effects, Charlton Heston’s stoic performance, several iconic soundbites, and of course one of the most famous twist endings in the history of cinema.
While it more than holds up today as an entertaining and inventive blockbuster, taking off the rose-tinted glasses of nostalgia means that it may not be the best of the bunch. It’s comfortably the finest of the first batch of Apes films by quite some distance, but in terms of the cream of the absolute crop, it’s hard to look past Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.
With Rupert Wyatt having laid the groundwork through the stellar Rise, Matt Reeves picked up the baton and ran with it. Andy Serkis is phenomenal as Caesar in his best performance across the trilogy, while the visual effects are even more sophisticated than they were in its predecessor, adding an extra layer of immersion.
Toby Kebbell’s Koba makes for the franchise’s best villain bar none, with the intoxicating power struggle between the two simians with diametrically opposed belief systems powering a narrative that deals with relevant themes of alienation, assimilation, distrust of outsiders, and the inevitability of human conflict.
All that, and it features apes wielding machine guns on horseback and piloting a tank, which absolutely rules. As always, the flesh-and-blood characters aren’t the most well-rounded or three-dimensional, but Dawn of the Planet of the Apes stands tall as the best of the bunch.
None of it would have happened without Heston’s unforgettable originator, obviously, but in terms of technical wizardry, artistic achievement, performances, set pieces, and white-knuckle tension, Reeves’ middle chapter takes the cake. Or maybe banana, in this case.
How many Planet of the Apes movies are there?
The short answer is probably more than there needs to have been, although if the upcoming Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes lives up to the potential showcased in the promotional materials thus far, then there could be plenty more to come unless audiences actively rebel against the franchise.
Heston’s 1968 Planet of the Apes was followed by sequels in four consecutive years, with 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 releasing between 1970 and 1973. Tim Burton’s ill-judged remake followed almost two decades later, before the property took another extended sabbatical.
Rise, Dawn, and War combined to form one of the all-time great blockbuster trilogies, with Wes Ball’s Kingdom marking the 11th theatrically-released entry in the franchise, and that’s without mentioning the live-action and animated TV shows that premiered in 1974 and 1975, respectively.
What is Planet of the Apes based on?
Pierre Boulle – who also authored the novel that would spawn another cinema classic in Bridge on the River Kwai – published La Planète des singes in 1963, although plenty of changes to the book were made by the time Hollywood got its stinking paws on the rights.
In the Planet of the Apes novel, French astronauts travel to another world that definitely isn’t Earth, which is inhabited by intelligent apes who use modern amenities, including guns and vehicles. When the heroes escape and return to their own planet, they discover it’s been overrun by apes in the centuries they’ve been away due to time dilation.
The entire story is told through a framing device after spacefarers Jinn and Phyllis rescue a manuscript from a bottle, and it turns out they’re not only apes themselves but unable to believe the idea that humans used to be as intelligent as anything other than ludicrous.
