Planet of the Apes (TV)
"Planet of the Apes" is a television series that stems from the iconic 1968 film, which itself is based on Pierre Boulle's 1963 novel. The narrative centers around the reversal of roles between apes and humans on an Earth-like planet, where human characters, including astronauts, are captured by an advanced civilization of apes. The series features characters such as astronaut Alan Virdon, portrayed by Ron Harper, and Galen, a chimpanzee played by Roddy McDowall, as they navigate the complexities of this new society while seeking a way to return home.
Themes of the series echo those of the original film and book, addressing issues such as bureaucratic power, social stratification, and the consequences of human actions. The apes in the story have created a society that, while lacking in war, is constrained by rigid social hierarchies and resistance to new ideas, reflecting broader concerns about humanity's future. The series, while short-lived, continued to explore these cautionary tales relevant to the cultural climate of the time, especially during the socially tumultuous 1960s. The lasting impact of "Planet of the Apes" is evident in its ability to provoke thought on societal issues through the lens of science fiction.
Planet of the Apes (TV)
Released 1968
Director Franklin J. Schaffner
A motion picture that envisions an authoritarian society ruled by apes. It is a biting satire of the bureaucratic mind, scientific progress, and race relations.
Key Figures
Franklin J. Schaffner (1920-1989), film director
The Work
The film Planet of the Apes is based on a book with the same title by Pierre Boulle, first published in French in 1963 as Le planète des singes and translated into English the same year. In the book, the story revolves around French journalist Ulysse Mérou, who is part of an expedition to an Earth-like planet where the roles of apes and humans are reversed. He and his companions are captured by the apes, who use them as zoological specimens.
During the course of his stay, Ulysse learns to communicate with two chimpanzee scientists, Cornelius and Zira, and convinces them of his intelligence. He civilizes a woman who has reverted to a primitive lifestyle and eventually names her Nova. The bureaucratic orangutan, Zaius, sees Ulysse as a threat and devises a scheme to get rid of him. Ulysse, with the help of the two scientists, escapes on his rocketship with Nova and their child and returns to Paris.
In his book, Boulle attacks bureaucracy as seen in the form of the inflexible Zaius. Ulysse discovers that the human decivilization of the Earth-like planet was brought about through people’s failure to use their minds.
The 1968 film is less abstract in its themes and reflects the concerns of 1960’s audiences. In the film, the action centers around astronaut George Taylor. The misanthropic Taylor and his two companions, Dodge, the curious scientist, and Landon, the egocentric explorer, suffer karmic fates: Dodge is killed and placed in a museum, Landon becomes a lobotomized pet, and Taylor realizes that humankind is greater than the ape. The film also explores racism by making it clear that the scientist chimpanzees inhabit the lowest rungs of ape society and delves into the contradictions of mixing religion and science. In the film, Zaius is portrayed as a fanatical, scripture-quoting hypocrite, more interested in maintaining the status quo than in expanding the knowledge of his society.
The most striking image in both the film and the book is when the two heroes discover the fate of Earth. Ulysse returns to Paris, where, although Ulysse has been gone less than ten years, seven hundred years have passed. Earth has also evolved into a planet of the apes, so Ulysse escapes, leaving an account in a bottle that is found by two chimpanzees. In the film, Taylor, in an ending that reflects 1960’s fears, runs off into the wasteland where he finds the top of the Statue of Liberty sticking out of the sand and realizes that the Earth-like planet of the apes is actually Earth. His contemporaries had destroyed themselves in a nuclear holocaust, leaving the apes to develop their own society.
Impact
The book and the film were meant as cautionary tales bearing messages about racism, corruptive power, and the inevitability of fate by drawing parallels between the apes and people. In both versions, the apes, unlike humans, have been able to achieve a utopian society where there is no war, but they, like humans, have developed stratified societies that have become too conservative to accept new knowledge and are evolving toward disaster. The idea of a disastrous destiny appealed to many people during the turbulent 1960’s and in subsequent decades, preserving the popularity of the book and film. The film spawned several sequels in the 1970’s and a television series.
Related Work
Stranger in a Strange Land (1961), by Robert Heinlein, uses a similar theme involving a man alienated from the society in which he finds himself. In Heinlein’s work, however, the man, raised by Martians, is alienated from his own people.