Movies

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014)

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Here is my take on Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. Please feel free to weigh in with your thoughts — pros, cons, yays, nays, new series rankings, whatever — in the comments section. In other words: have at it, nerds.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Rupert Wyatt’s smart and involving revival of the long-dormant Planet of the Apes franchise, ended on such a note of triumph that it was easy for both casual and committed fans the series to forget how uncharacteristic this was for an Apes movie. Rise had its moments of sadness and loss, of course, both human and animal, and its end-credit map of how simian flu spread across the globe offered foreboding for the next chapter. But its climactic sequences of Apes running wild approximated a bigger, more fun version of the violent outbreak that closed Conquest of the Planet of the Apes, its closest relative in the previous series. The apes weren’t out to kill all humans; they just caused some beautifully shot mayhem in the name of ape freedom. Their endgame was a forest settlement to call their own; the destruction (mostly non-lethal) was just collateral damage.

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes keeps the collateral damage, loses the triumph — which makes it a clear successor to the original films.

Continue reading Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014) →

Books, Life, Movies, Music, TV

Planet of the Apes Week!

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Join us in a world turned upside down by SportsAlcohol.com’s Planet of the Apes coverage!

We’ve got:

…an Apes series primer for the uninitiated.

…an appreciation of Dr. Zira, our favorite chimpanzee.

…a look at a little seen collection of apocalyptic poetry by Apes writer Paul Dehn (with illustrations by Edward Gorey!).

…a collection of tie-in media to get you up to speed on the time that’s passed between Rise of the Planet of the Apes and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.

…a flashback to 2001, and what Tim Burton’s Planet of the Apes taught Marisa about friendship.

…a chat about Rob & Jesse’s disastrous (though never prosecuted) attempt to see Burton’s Apes.

…a rundown of the original concept for Battle for the Planet of the Apes.

…the SportsAlcohol.com ‘Ape Escape’ cocktail that helped Sabrina conquer her terror of chimpanzees enough to maybe watch a Planet of the Apes movie.

…Jesse’s review of Dawn of the Planet of the Apes!

…and a Tumblr with lots of Apes related bits and bobs. Posters! Songs! Trailers! Variety show appearances!

TaylorLaughing

Movies

Hail Caesar! The OTHER Battle For The Planet Of The Apes

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In talking about the differences between the finished film and Dehn’s earlier drafts, we’re going to be getting into some of the surprises (and the endings) of the finished films.  I did my best to avoid giving too much away in the Primer, but now we’re going to get a little more specific.  So once again, let me just urge you to go watch the series and then come back here.  They’re well worth it!  Anyway, here’s your SPOILER WARNING.

The Planet of the Apes series became one of the greatest and most indelible in all science fiction thanks to the contributions of many talented men and women:

  • Cast members like Charlton Heston, Kim Hunter, Roddy McDowall, Maurice Evans, Linda Harrison, James Gregory, Claude Akins, Natalie Trundy, Paul Williams, and Ricardo Montalban
  • Producer Arthur P. Jacobs
  • Makeup genius John Chambers
  • Directors Franklin Schaffner, Ted Post, Don Taylor, and J. Lee Thompson
  • Writers Pierre Boulle, Rod Serling, Michael Wilson, John & Joyce Corrington

But as the writer of three out of the five films, Paul Dehn could be said to be the architect of original series.  Unfortunately, due to poor health in the last years of his life (his final produced screenplay was for Sidney Lumet’s Murder On the Orient Express in 1974; he would die two years later) Dehn bowed out of writing the screenplay for the finale of the series, Battle for the Planet of the Apes.  The Corringtons were brought in to replace him, and while he provided a final polish on their script, the final film differs greatly from Dehn’s original conception for the fourth sequel.
Continue reading Hail Caesar! The OTHER Battle For The Planet Of The Apes →

Life, Movies

Ejected from the Planet of the Apes

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Rob and I were ejected from the Planet of the Apes (the movie, not the planet) in 2001. We got a chat going to explain what happened.

ROB
When was the last time we IM’d each other?

JESSE
Probably sometime after we saw Planet of the Apes 2001 but also way before Rise of the Planet of the Apes came out in 2011.

ROB
Only a decade between the two? It felt like a lifetime

JESSE
Right? A lot of these franchises get rebooted or whatever way too fast, but we straight up got into long-term relationships and got married in the lapse between Apes movies.

ROB
Sabrina and I had been dating a few months. But I don’t know if she had yet to meet my parents when we first attempted to see the Tim Burton Planet of the Apes.

JESSE
I had met Marisa the spring before at school and we were chatting online a lot that summer. In fact I think her friends went to go see it the same night that we tried and I’m sure I emailed or IMed her about our misadventure.

ROB
Oh you guys were totes in touch, but you hadn’t sealed the deal yet

MARISA
So this is a Google Hangout?

ROB
I don’t know if this counts as a real Google hangout because it’s text only Google hangouts are an insidious plot to get unsuspecting people to sign up for Google+

JESSE
First: background by way of what I’ve been listening to on a loop for the past 24 hours and am listening to RIGHT NOW: I got my cassette-to-computer device working and ripped the audio of Planet of the Tapes, the mix tape I made for the drive to Crossgates Mall to see Planet of the Apes (2001). At least the intro will be available as a download with the transcript of this conversation.

ROB
Ugh, I prepped for this by listening to the Apes jams bonus tracks on Severe Tire Damage. I learned nothing.

JESSE
But SO DID I, because those bonus tracks are all over the mix! Weirdly, though I had only seen the 1968 original at the time, the two best They Might Be Giants improv’d Apes songs are in fact my two favorite Planet of the Apes sequels: Escape from the Planet of the Apes and Conquest of the Planet of the Apes.

ROB
“This Ape’s For You” isn’t one of your favorite Apes movies?

JESSE
OK, so to fill in, Rob and I and our buddies did this thing where we made 30-minute tapes for the drive to Saratoga to Crossgates Mall outside of Albany, for the movies we were particularly psyched about.

ROB
Our buddies was usually Jesse, Me, Chris, Jeff, and whatever girl had yet to realize we weren’t that charming.

JESSE
I was trying to remember what the other mixtape-worthy movies of summer 2001 were, and I’m pretty sure it was just Moulin Rouge! and A.I.… which is actually pretty spot-on. But in retrospect, it’s weird that Apes was the only really big blockbuster type thing that got the tape treatment that summer. Which actually makes sense because summer ’01 was a bunch of really uninspired sequels and also Michael Bay’s interpretation of Pearl Harbor.

ROB
It ended up being low key as it was me, you, Chris, and Ofy. But the ape tape is important to the story.
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Life, Movies

Going Ape

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When I think about friends I’ve had throughout my life, one common thread that runs through all of them is the ability to get excited about something. The “something” is only of secondary importance (though I’m sure if you were passionate about something I find loathsome, a friendship might not work out). But the ability to get into something, feel strongly about it, argue about it, write about it, make lists about it, or just generally be about it is apparently something I find important in people.

While it’s essential that you have the ability to get excited about something, it’s even better if you can muster enthusiasm for next to nothing. Which brings us to Tim Burton’s Planet of the Apes.

If you recall—and Jesse and Rob get into this in more detail—in the summer of 2001, there wasn’t much to get excited about. Before Burton’s Apes, the big blockbuster-type movies that year were The Mummy Returns, Pearl Harbor, Atlantis: The Lost Empire, The Fast and the Furious (surprise hit!), and Jurassic Park III. Okay, we also had Moulin Rouge and A.I., but it was a summer of slim pickings. I still went to the movies often, but there was not that much to really rev up the anticipation engine.

With enthusiasm to spare and nowhere to direct it, and being a bunch of kids on college break living out in the suburbs, Burton’s Planet of the Apes became The Thing We Get Excited About among my friends. I don’t really remember how or why it was chosen. (I do have a theory about how suburban upbringings and unconditional love for Tim Burton go hand-in-hand, but that’s a different post for a different day.) I just remember that it was decided: We Will Go All Out for Apes. And we did.

Apes4
I love this photo, and not just because you can’t see me in it. First off, you can see that we got big group to go to the movie in the first place (six in the photo, me taking the photo, and at least one more in the photo below). If this movie came out today, I don’t know if I could scrounge nearly 10 people to go see it unless it had a good Rotten Tomatoes score.

Also, we brought apes! And monkeys, of all sizes. (I’m pretty sure that purple one up front is mine, and his name is John Flansburgh because I bought him at Serendipity 3 after a They Might Be Giants concert.) One of my friends brought an ape so big, I was afraid they were going to make him buy a ticket for it.

Ape2

We were definitely Team Ape. You can’t see it in the photos I think a few of us even drew “GO APES!” on ourselves, homecoming pep rally-style. It didn’t matter that the movie wound up falling into the bottom tier of Apes movies and the bottom tier of Tim Burton movies.

It’s pretty easy to find a friend that will go with you to a critically acclaimed, Oscar-preordained, box office smash. But if you find people who will go with you to a possibly junky, head-scratching Mark Wahlberg vehicle—and bring stuffed animals, and write on themselves, and generally root for the apes, well, then, that’s a friend for life.

Books, Movies

Before the Dawn of the Planet of the Apes

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Dawn of the Planet of the Apes reportedly takes place ten years after the conclusion of Rise of the Planet of the Apes. We’ll have to see the film to find out just what Caesar and his fellow apes are up to now, but in the meantime we’ve watched some short films and read a licensed novel that provide some information about that missing decade and humankind’s struggle with what’s been dubbed the Simian Flu.
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Movies

The Apocalyptic Poetry of Paul Dehn

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By 1969, British writer Paul Dehn had spent time as a film critic, a spy during World War II, and as a screenwriter of films including Goldfinger and The Spy Who Came In From The Cold. But it was his work as a poet that would ultimately link him inextricably with one of the most inventive and socially conscious film series of all time.
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Movies

Team Zira

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Dr. Zaius gets the coolest songs from The Simpsons.  Caesar gets all of the respect. But, if you ask me who my favorite ape is in the Planet of the Apes series, there’s only one possible answer: Zira.

Zira — actually, that’s Dr. Zira — is a chimpanzee, a scientist,  a pacifist, and half of the husband/wife team of Cornelius and Zira.  Still, even though she’s closely associated with a partner, she’s her own ape, and she’ll let you know about it. Here are reasons to be Team Zira.

She’s Basically Right About Everything

 

In Planet of the Apes, she figures out everything pretty quickly: That Taylor is intelligent, that he can talk, and that he must prove that apes evolved from not-mute humans. She does this through the awesome power SCIENCE! (And, uh, human lobotomies.) A lot of talk is thrown around in that first movie about what makes someone intelligent, and Zira shows by example, taking in the evidence around her and drawing a conclusion that makes sense, even if it changes her worldview.

She’s Braver Than Cornelius

Or at least more outspoken. In Planet of the Apes, Cornelius is afraid to unearth his discoveries in the Forbidden Zone, fearing they’d be charged with heresy. She pushes him into it. In Escape From the Planet of the Apes, she also urges them reveal the truth about where they come from while Cornelius is being wishy-washy. She doesn’t just understand the truth, she advocates for it.

She Becomes a Feminist Icon

ZiraPantsuit

And wears a pantsuit. And gets drunk. Pretty much everything she says and does in Escape From the Planet of the Apes is amazing.

She’s Played by Kim Hunter

Kim Hunter

Aka Stella Kowalski from A Streetcar Named Desire.  She’s an Oscar winner, y’all.

Where’s the Next Zira?

Cornelia

Like everyone else, I was extremely pleased with Rise of the Planet of the Apes, especially the way the climax of the movie seems to go on forever. If there’s one disappointment, it’s that there wasn’t a Zira equivalent. There were hardly any female apes at all, really — one, Cornelia, was pointed out, but didn’t get to do anything — let alone one as strong and confident as Zira. Cornelia is listed in the IMDb credits for Dawn of the Planet of the Apes — played by Judy Greer, no less — so let’s hope she’s cast in the Zira mold.

Movies, TV

A ‘Planet of the Apes’ Primer

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This weekend’s Dawn of the Planet of the Apes will be the eighth feature film (the second in the new series that began with 2011’s Rise of the Planet of the Apes) in a franchise that has spanned books, film, television, and comics over the last fifty years. The Apes series, with its popularity, merchandise, and ancillaries, in many ways prefigured the modern franchise era that is generally acknowledged as beginning with Star Wars (and was codified with 1989’s Batman).

That Planet of the Apes became such a sensation is especially interesting because the series is so deeply weird. Full of powerful inversions to go along with the story’s portrait of a world turned upside down, the series was hugely popular with children despite being full of talky moral debate and featuring relentessly downbeat endings. Just as audiences find themselves oriented in a world where the humans are subjugated and apes rule, the series will turn things around and get them to identify with the apes and root against humankind (and then, perhaps, back again). This is a series that extends a further three entries after an ending that would seem to preclude any further stories.

First things first, I can’t suggest strongly enough that you should just go and watch the original series of five films. They’re imaginative adventure films with memorable characters and rich socio-political content, and they’re so full of twists and turns that even if you know the big reveal at the end of the first film there are still plenty of shocking twists and turns in store. Continue reading A ‘Planet of the Apes’ Primer →

Books, Movies, Music, TV

Ruth Graham, Not Quite Wrong: Why Liking YA Literature Doesn’t Make It Great

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Do you read? Do you also read the internet? If so, you might be aware of an article posted on Slate by Ruth Graham, pegged to Fault in Our Stars mania as a film based on that ultra-popular, mega-beloved John Green young-adult novel was poised to make a killing at the box office (it did, albeit in a more Twilight-y way that some might have expected, given its mostly positive reviews). Graham’s piece discussed the phenomenon of adults reading YA literature, and her argument against it. It was dismissive, maybe even a little haughty, and outfitted with a sensationalist headline (backed up by some actual sensationalist prose) about how adults should be embarrassed to read these kinds of books.

And a part of me agreed with her.

Let me be clear: I do not agree with the idea that anyone should be embarrassed by what they read. Though I don’t use my degree in Library Science (I prefer the Dark Arts of Libraries, but that’s not what the diploma says) often, one thing I did take away from my professors, many of them with experience as school or public librarians, was that reading is reading is reading. It is a net positive, no matter what it is that’s being read. We all have things we read that we could, in different contexts or historical periods, be embarrassed about: comic books, Choose Your Own Adventure, romance novels, Garfield books, Animorphs, Twilight, Slate. There is no reason to be embarrassed by what you read because whatever it is, you have it over on someone who does not read at all.

Strangely, although reading is generally seen as a more worthwhile pursuit than watching things, the stigma attached to watching the “wrong” things seems far smaller, far easier to laugh off. People talk about how they watch those Real Housewives shows all the time. As a movie guy who prides himself on having pretty good taste, I’m not embarrassed to have seen Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever and I’m not even embarrassed to have seen and enjoyed a number of Resident Evil movies. I’m sure some people would be, but I wonder if the general academic/education notion that sitting in front of the TV (or, now, screenamajig) was generally bad for you (save the occasional ingestion of PBS) was in vogue for so long that some are still working through the distinction between bad TV and just TV, in terms of potential embarrassment. I understand that the alleged extremely high quality of television gets a lot of press these days, but I’m speaking in terms of culture-at-large perceptions here, not necessarily of the pop-culture-studies AV Club audience.

In any event: on the matter of embarrassment, regardless of how tongue-in-cheek and/or attention-baiting its use was intended, Graham is incorrect. Friend of and hopefully future contributor to SportsAlcohol.com Jen Vega wrote a very smart piece further dismantling much of Graham’s argument in a thoughtful, measured way. Graham is wrong about a lot.

That said, again:

A part of me agreed with her.
Continue reading Ruth Graham, Not Quite Wrong: Why Liking YA Literature Doesn’t Make It Great →