Planet of the Apes

[raj]

Just watched it on History Channel last night (the original, not the atrocious remake).  What a great movie, I think someone should do a sequel. 

[Doc Daneeka]

You mean to the original? There were actually 4 (3 of them prequels in a way), and I don't think the remake was that bad!

[Andrew]

Ah, but I do love this one.  Not only does it have a simple message, but it is also perversely funny.  Seeing a talking gorilla spray Charlton Heston with a fire house, with the ape yelling, "Shut up you freak!" and Heston screaming, "It's a mad house!" is awesome.

Review here:
http://www.badmovies.org/movies/planetapes/index.html

"Beneath the Planet of the Apes" is entertaining in a b-movie sort of way.  Did you like how long it took the poor man's Heston to figure out he was in a New York subway tunnel?

[odinn7]

The original is one of my favorite films...I loved it as a kid and still do. Great stuff.

[raj]

I'd swear that the subway in Beneath looked better than some current lines in NY's system.

In the 1970s WABC in New York would have the 4:30 movie -- so after school I'd get to watch a movie before supper.  They'd occasionally have a Planet of the Apes week where they'd run all of the Planet movies throughout the week.  I'm sure they chopped up the movies a bit, but they were still entertaining.

[Bill C.]

I'm kind of surprised nobody's hit on the fact that the Hitler Channel was showing this...

[Yaddo 42]

Hell, according to the TV listings, they show The Road Warrior from time to time.

I don't mind fictional films set within real historical events, but when they show films set in the future or even alternate timelines if we have past the date the film was set in, they kind of thumb their noses at the concept of history.

I guess you can say these films reflect our feelings at the time about the future, if you wanted to justify it. BY that reasoning, they can show Escape from New York to reflect how America felt about crime in NYC at the time. Or Escape from LA as a reflection of political correctness and fears about rise of the Christian Right that took up much of the social and political landscape in the 90s. Yeah that's the ticket.

I used to love to catch POTA on the Sunday night late movie on channel 6 from Birmingham. The first three used to play on a local independent station when I was kid. I never saw the last two until they turned up on AMC. I like the look and atmosphere of the fourth one. The fifth one disappoints me, you could tell they were squeezing every last cent out of the franchise.

Just imagine what they could have done with the series if they had kept the budgets roughly the same from film to film rather than slashing them each time. Diminishing returns and all, just wish they had more scope over the course of the series.

[Joe]

i just watched this recently too, it is a very good movie there is just something about it makes me like it. i do special effects so it might be the make-up for the time period.

[RCMerchant]

Anyone remember watching the lame TV show?

[Bill C.]

Ever so vaguely, in the middle of the night when I was a kid...that about sums it up.

[JaseSF]

Well I for one thought the TV Show was very underrated. It certainly featured some fine acting talent and I enjoyed the outdoors settings. I have a review of the TV Series over at Scifilm.

[Gerry]

I thought the TV series was pretty good too.

[RCMerchant]

Well, it WAS better than the Tony Orlando and Dawn Show...or alot of prime time TV of the seventies,come to think of it. But even the lamest of the films was better IMO. It just seemed too ...talky.

[CheezeFlixz]

I've got the entire collection including the TV show ... it has excellent re-watchability. The first one, as always was best IMHO. I even like the remake albeit it could have been better.

[RCMerchant]

    Need a star for the sequel?