[Inspector Abberline]

Planet of the Apes (1968 )

Why do I keep going back to this film,what is it that has a hold of me *Take your stinking paws off me, you damned dirty ape!" How can i watch a film over again and still get a lump in my throat when that ending approaches,it still has a power to make you think. Like Taylor (Charlton Heston) we realise that the humans are doomed,what ever they do,which ever route they take they are ultimately doomed.Its a great fantasy to think about,an whole new life form taking over the planet where the humans have fumbled the ball. but when we look at ape society,its not quite the utopia it should be,like the Labour party its pretty much split down the middle,between the scientific establishment which is portrayed by Roddy McDowall as Cornelius and Kim Hunter as Zira,the peace loving chimpanzees,then there is the bureaucratic orangutans as portrayed by Maurice Evans as Dr. Zaius a kind of EU,managing to wrap everything in red tape and being very good at talking alot but doing very little except cover up the secret of man.Finally there is the gorillas,dressed black fetishistic uniforms and pretty much encompassing the far right of politics.Which basically leaves the humans,as the illegal immigrants,hoarded into camps, and brutally experimented on for the purposes of ape kind. Where as the remakes have tried to be a bit to clever in there evolution of the apes,the original for goes all that and gets straight into the story,you literally crash land into the film knowing very little of what is going to happen,but like Taylor when you first get a glimpse of the apes on horseback and when you hear them talk for the first time you kind of get it instantly,you do not need any back story or evolution,its talking apes for f""ks sake. I luv this film for many reason,and it has nothing to do with Linda Harrison as Nova in her furry bikini.