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Planet of the apes... |
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Movie
Review: Planet of the apes
Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Tim
Roth, Helen Bonham Carter, Michael Clarke Duncan, Paul Giamatti, Estella
Warren
Writer: Mark Rosenthal,
Lawrence Konner, William Broyles Jr., based on the novel by Pierre Boulle
Director: Tim Burton |
Captain Leo Davidson (Mark Wahlberg) is a US astronaut
working with genetically enhanced |
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chimpanzees abroad a spacefaring vessel. When
Davidson's personally trained chimpanzee is lost in space, he sets out after him and
crash-lands on a lush planet. He falls right in the path of rogue humans who are being
chased and rounded up by apes, led by the silverback Attar (Michael Clarke Duncan).
Humans, who are in the majority on the planet, are slaves and pets of the ruling species:
angry apes. The apes have evolved a society not unlike our own: there's a class structure
and the powerful dominate the weak. There's |
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clearly a sense of species superiority based entirely
on the prominence of ape testosterone-fueled intelligence. What is so provocative about
this film is how easily the apes' behavior is recognizable, understandable, and
contemptible.
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The characters are richly drawn and complex. The villainous
leader of the army, Thade (Tim Roth), brings out the archetypal essence of the ape's
aggressive nature. Thade has only one weakness: his feelings for Ari (Helena Bonham
Carter), the privileged daughter of a senator who is a human rights activist. Ari helps
Davidson and a group of humans, led by Karubie (Kris Kristofferson) and his daughter Limbo
(Estella Warren) escape slavery. It's Limbo who notices the attraction between Ari and
Davidson. Much has been written about whether or not Ari and |
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Davidson were going to "hook up." Given the set-up - Ari (60% human/40%
ape) risks her life for Davidson (who, as a human, already shares 98 percent of his genes
with the chimpanzee) as well as Ari's advanced thinking on the dignity of humans.
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Unequivocally, the best plotted, acted, designed, and
directed summer movie of 2001! From the opening shot, the movie careens with heightened
aggression and sudden, raging violence. Nothing about the movie is typical and
predictable. The screenwriters, William Broyes, Jr. and Lawrence Konner & Mark
Rosenthal (said to have rewritten most of it on set), should be singled out for
their cleverness and attention to detail. On Earth, human intelligence arose directly from
chimpanzee intelligence; on the planet envisioned here, we find out exactly what happened
to upset the evolutionary blueprint. Ape |
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society, mirroring our own, rules. Burton has produced a terrific movie
with actors who really inhabit the characters simian proclivities.
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