Aug 25, 2014

Beneath the Planet of the Apes

Saw Beneath the Planet of the Apes, a sequel to the one everyone knows, The Planet of the Apes. In this one the speaking humans (as opposed to the mute future-humans) discover that the ruins of New York City exists underneath the ape planet. This ruined city is inhabited by psychic humans who communicate by sonar-like brain-hums and worship an atomic bomb.

The film is very pulpy and comic-book-ish. The original was as well though, so I feel this is a kind of fitting sequel. There's much less tongue-in-cheek juxtaposition of human and beast. The apes still refer to the humans as animals and a sympathetic ape bandages a human, informing him she is trained as a vet. There's some heavy-handed allegory involving anti-war apes who are carted off into cages as their anti-war posters are ground under the heel of marching soldiers (subtle!)

Also there's the whole outrageous outrage of the psychics worshipping a bomb. They're kind of cast as hypocritical utilitarians. They claim to be a peaceful people who "force their enemies to destroy each other." The film ends with a piece of schadenfreude which makes the humans exactly as spiteful and hypocritical however, so so much for any message.

The film isn't bad, just very pulpy and heavy-handed. There's a lot of though floating around, but not much cleverness. Consistency plays second fiddle to spectacle and pat cuteness reigns. It's got the 70s messiness thing going on though which ensures that the cute isn't too overly cute, but it's not exactly trenchant either. Kind of a toss-off, but not bad.

No comments:

Post a Comment