From Another Planet...

» retroqueen - My Take on the Movie

I was very much looking forward to seeing the remake of "Planet of the Apes", but I discovered that its hype was somewhat greater than what it actually delivered.

I was vaguely disappointed, but I should have been on guard immediately when I found out who was to direct the film. Tim Burton with quirky sense of humour in toto, gave the film a strange comic twist. I was encouraged to laugh at it more than to scream in terror which was the response I was hoping for.

In some ways, humankind has come even closer to Armmegeddon than they had thirty years ago. What I wanted and expected to see was a story that picked up on that idea and carried it even further than was done in the orginal movie. It seems a shame to make such realistic looking apes and not use them to full advantage. They look so much more frightening than those in the original. Perhaps because they look so much more human. Moreover this was a theme explored in the orginal film. What is human? Is it typified in how a person looks or in how he/she acts? Some say a "man" should be judged by his acts not his looks. Others also say, "Oh would the power a Giftie gie us to see ourselves as others see us."

Instead we are bombarded by certainly undeniably funny scenes of the apes private lives which resemble some weirded out version of a Discovery Channel show on ape sexual practices.

I am not sure I like the ending either. It seems to me that Burton could have come up with a more original ending. But I invite anyone to present an opposing view of my thoughts here-or not.

-- posted by retroqueen

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