How many film franchises can you name that have had as many installments as that which began with the original Planet of the Apes (1968)?  There have been some, the more famous of them being Star Wars or the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU).  We often think of George Lucas’ creation as the one that gave rise to a movie series taking hold of society, and yet the original run of Planet of the Apes went to five by 1973, with two television shows coming from it, all before Star Wars – Episode IV: A New Hope was released in 1977.  If Planet of the Apes is not a franchise, I do not know what is.  However, I cannot tell you exactly what attracted people to the first, today’s review, at least not definitively.  I asked my dad, and he said something about the Vietnam War (1964-1975), and I cannot deny that there is some subtext in the original that can be connected to that conflict.  It also does not tell the whole story as to why some of the most memorable lines in cinematic history come from this film.  Ultimately, the answer to that question is not my true concern.  As always, I will bring you a Catholic perspective on an extremely dense motion picture, cinematically speaking.

Before George Taylor (Charlton Heston) and the rest of the crew of an ANSA (I guess they could not get the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to sign off on this one) deep space mission get to the Planet of the Apes, George is contemplating the end of their voyage.  They have been gone for months, but he muses aloud about how Earth will be 700 years older by the time they land.  With this slightly disconcerting thought in mind, he closes his hibernation capsule and goes to sleep.  Something goes wrong during the opening credits because when he opens his eyes, they have had a watery crash landing.  Further, their female crewmate appears to have died long ago, and the rest of the men have beards.  George, along with Dodge (Jeff Burton) and Landon (Robert Gunner), manage to make it off their vessel before it sinks.  They make to the shore of a desert lake with seemingly nothing around them for miles.  Before they pick a direction to look for signs of life, George informs the others that according to the computers, over 2,000 years have elapsed and they are on a planet orbiting a star in Orion’s belt.  This news disturbs Landon, but all George is thinking about is survival.  This means looking for anything that can sustain them.  Following a trail of vegetation leads them to a waterfall oasis, but it quickly becomes evident that they are being watched.  These are primitive humans, and they steal the spacemen’s clothing and other gear, tearing it to shreds.  This is only the beginning of their troubles.  No sooner do they catch up with the band of unwitting thieves than they are attacked by a group of apes on horseback.  They seem intent on rounding up the humans, but do not mind killing those that attempt to flee.  This includes Dodge and apparently Landon.  George is wounded in the throat during kerfuffle and captured.  When he comes to, he is strapped down to an operating table inside some kind of laboratory.  Confusingly, the monkeys are talking.  Somewhat luckily, he is in the care of Dr. Zira (Kim Hunter), a chimpanzee descendant who studies animal psychology.  She quickly labels George “Bright Eyes” because she sees something different in him, particularly when it looks as though he can understand what she is saying.  This is different from humans of that time, who stare dumbly off into space when they are not behaving like beasts.  George would communicate with her verbally if not for his injured neck, which is preventing speech.  Instead, he resorts to stealing paper and pen from Dr. Zira.  The writing of his name is a shocking revelation for her, warranting further analysis.  With him on a collar and leash, he conveys the fact that he is from another planet and time, which Dr. Zira and her fiancé, Dr. Cornelius (Roddy McDowall), find farfetched.  It is Dr. Zaius (Maurice Evans), the apes’ chief scientist and the defender of the faith, that is most threatened by George.  On the heels of an unsuccessful escape attempt, one that ends with George regaining his speech (with the famous line about “dirty apes”), he is put on trial before Dr. Zaius and their president (James Whitmore).  The proceedings are a shame, meant to expose George as an abomination and uphold their laws about the superiority of apes over humans, despite Cornelius and Dr. Zira’s best efforts.  After this is over, George is brought to Dr. Zaius privately, who offers to save the human from a life of experimentation if George would tell the truth about his origin.  George remains firm, and is sent back to his cell.  He does not have to wait there long as Dr. Zira sends her nephew, Lucious (Lou Wagner), to free George, who insists on bringing the woman given to him, Nova (Linda Harrison).  Together, they head back towards where George first crashed, an area the simians refer to as the Forbidden Lands.  Drs. Cornelius and Zira see their insurrection as a way of gathering proof that what they have been told about their past might be wrong.  On the coast is a cave in which Dr. Cornelius had conducted archaeological digs uncovering artifacts that call into question some of what they have been taught.  Dr. Zaius shows up at this time to attempt to refute these claims, yet he soon admits that he knows that humans had once been the dominant species.  For George, he assumes these items point to some other humanoid inhabitants.  It is not until Dr. Zaius lets George and Nova go that George learns the truth.  Farther along the coast they come to the remnants of the Statue of Liberty, which proves to George that they had been on Earth the entire time.  We end with an anguished astronaut cursing his kind.

The reveal at the end of Planet of the Apes is the true point of the movie.  The entire time it leads you to think that George has come from somewhere else, but the finale demonstrates otherwise in a horrifying matter.  The rest of the film is taken up with a quasi-religious/scientific treatise on racism.  That is not just me being a Christian and seeing the inhumanity of how apes in this world feel towards humans.  To this point, there is a moment where ape religion says that they were all created by the same god, which makes all apes equal.  Because humans can neither think or reason, to apes they are inferior.  The brutality with which humans are treated, though, is out of phase with how a Christian is taught to approach animal species, which is how simians think of their counterparts.  What this movie is really doing is turning society on its head, underscoring centuries of racial thinking that said that certain groups were on the same level as chimpanzees, for example.  One need look no further than so-called sciences like eugenics to find the egregious mistakes on race by our forebears.  Those misguided people who believed such nonsense also incorporated erroneous interpretations of Christianity to back up their thoughts.  I am not here to tell you that the Catholic Church has been perfect since its inception.  Yet, it has had a longer record of treating everyone with the God-given dignity that it teaches everyone has, regardless of the color of their skin.  Over the centuries, saints have come from every level of society, every corner of the globe, and they far outweigh the number of instances of institutional prejudice as what you can see on display in the film.  Movies like this are interesting for what they highlight at the time they are made, but they also paint a broad picture of what they are portraying.  The point is that, like the Catholic Church, we should be thankful for people like Dr. Zira that can see past our preconceptions.

I know this review still did not answer the question as to why Planet of the Apes was, and is, so popular.  For those who made it, there was genuine concern that it was going to be taken as hokey.  In many respects, it is.  It was made at a transitional time in the United States in many respects.  For example, there is a lot of male nudity in it, something you did not see often in movies before 1968.  This is not the reason to see it.  I am not sure why you would watch it, actually, but doing so is not a total loss.