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Any thoughts on the first Apes sequel?
The main difference between the first two films lies in the film-making and the production values. Keep in mind that BENEATH is directed and look like a television movie: see the old-fashioned processes. By contrast, Ted Post's formatted input is cheap unlike Franklin J. Schaffner's grandeur.
BENEATH has less money and you can see it: remember the bad makeup of the apes agitators in the background.
BENEATH also reflects the sociology of the era in a blunt way.
And finally, as stated above, the easy and nihilistic outcome that doesn't allow to expand the fate of the characters.
Picture if you will Taylor, Brent and Nova surviving the ordeal...
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It does have more of a Saturday-matinee feeling to it than the first film, and the ending is stupidly rushed, but the pure insanity of the Mass for the Bomb (one of the most stupefying scenes from a major studio film I can recall) and the intelligent script make it worth watching. I like all of the movies except for "Battle."
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As much as I've always loved the Apes films, this one in particular, too many things are wrong with it, things that could have been fixed with a rewrite and a change of perspective.
1. Brent is on a ship looking for Taylor. Why? They never expected Taylor and his crew to come back, so why mount a rescue mission? Why not just make Brent's ship part of the same mission?
2. Where the hell did Taylor keep his dogtags all that time? In his ass?
3. I always found it amazing that the mutants could make such realistic, lifelike and perfect latex masks.
4. The Alpha Omega Bomb. One single bomb can destroy the entire planet in seconds? Putting aside that's just totally ridiculous, why the hell would anyone want to make something like that? Who gains?
5. The ending. What's the point of destroying the world, story-wise? I can understand Heston not wanting to come back, but why not play it out the same, but have Brent escape? Tone down the A/O bomb so it is a small nuclear device which obliterates the mutants and the ape army. Then Brent, the last remaining intelligent and articulate human, can return to Ape City and, with Cornelius and Zira, work toward a peaceful future. Killing Taylor, Zaius, Nova and Ursus should be shocking and depressing enough. Pun intended, the finale as is, is overkill.
Yet, with all that, I like it? If for no other reason that it being the only other movie in the same world as the first. But even as a kid I noticed Taylor put on 20 pounds and got a shitload uglier between discovering the statue of Liberty and the end of the credits.
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As a youngster I was disturbed by the ending. I think the film holds up well for me and the score gives that 'time out of mind' vibe that Jerry's first Apes score did. In fact, that vibe did permeate all the five original scores and the TV series, not so much the animated series.
I think the bleakness of the ending sits well with 70s cinema.
As regards the post above mine saying filmed SF written by people who didn't know SF up until Logan's Run, that goes on even more so today.
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I don't get the sense that any of the people making SF today read books at all, let alone SF books.
There are so many worthy SF novels which would make amazing movies.
True. However, when was the last time you saw an SF novel adapted well for the screen? It nearly always ends up being totally different (but still good) or totally juvenile or unshophisticated. I think 9/10, an adaptation of a book loses something in the translation.
Although it's not SF, I think that Tom Stoppard's screenplay for The Russia House was superior to the book. That's rare, IMO.
I think this is deserving of a separate thread, this was about BTPOTA! Partially my fault...
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Well, to bring it back to the topic... The original POTA is very different from the book, and the sequel Boulle proposed was not used.
I look forward to your thread on that topic!
You are correct, the original POTA is completely different. Burton's remake, for all its many faults and just plain boring-ness, it did introduce the element from Boulle, that the POTA was actually an alien planet, then upon the protagonist's return to Earth, he finds it's become like the alien planet, with Apes ruling things.
Oh and new thread introduced!
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If I recall my beaten paperback of POTA, the original book had apes in jackets and ties and using high tech. Burton's seems closer to the original film than to the book, and that's why the final "BIG SHOCK!!!" is really lame--it jars you out of the film and makes you think "Wha...?" and did nothing to top the original's ending, which of course is an invention for the movie.
The animated series did stick to Boulle's novel, with vehicles and more modern environment, whilst retaining elements of the five films and TV series.
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