Escape From the Planet of the Apes (1971)

Written by: Paul Dehn (screenplay), Pierre Boulle (characters)
Directed by: Don Taylor
Starring: Roddy McDowall, Kim Hunter, and Bradford Dillman
Reviewer: Brett Gallman
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“That's what I'm worried about--'later.' Later we'll do something about pollution. Later we'll do something about the population explosion. Later we'll do something about the nuclear war. We think we've got all the time in the world, but how much time has the world got? Somebody has to begin to care.”

Reviewer's Rating: *** (Three Stars)

In a series that’s somewhat infamous for its shocking endings, the third entry starts with a shocker right off the bat. Yet another space ship has crash--landed; however, this time, it isn’t on future Earth, but present day Earth, and the shuttle isn’t manned (in every sense of the word) by men, but apes. Specifically, it’s Cornelius (Roddy McDowall) and Zira (Kim Hunter), who narrowly escaped the apocalypse of the previous film’s climax. Obviously, this second sequel flips the script completely by subjecting our two ape protagonists to the same sort of treatment as their human predecessors in the first two films. It’s clever enough and more interesting than Beneath, particularly once the main conflict ramps up and sends Cornelius and Zira on the run for their lives (before that, they just sort of wine, dine, and become huge celebrities--sort of silly, entertaining stuff, really.) That we want them to survive speaks volumes about McDowall and Hunter’s acting chops underneath all that makeup.

There’s some interesting philosophical stuff to ponder once again, particularly when the human captors begin to debate the ape problem. Should they use their knowledge of the future to alter it now, during the present (this of course leads to some mind-bending paradoxes)? At what cost should future peace of mind come? As was the case on future Earth, there are two camps--one side sympathetic to the apes, one side that is not. The latter is headed by a suspicious doctor (Eric Braeden) who wants to take a scorched earth approach to ensure human domination, which leads to some obvious questions about ends justifying means and whatnot.

But by this point, the Apes series is just good, pulpy fun. Escape delivers enough of that while also fleshing out the franchise mythology, as we finally get some details about just how the apes came to power. Of course, that didn’t stop producer Arthur Jacobs from telling the complete story in the next sequel, Conquest of the Planet of the Apes.

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