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From Cinescape Online
Dateline: Monday, July 30, 2001
An Ape By Any Other Name…
CINESCAPE compares the literary
and film exploits of Pierre Boulle’s amazing apes
By: TONY WHITT, Correspondent
 When Tim Burton first announced that his version of PLANET OF
THE APES would be a "re-imagining" and not a remake of the 1968
classic, many fans were outraged. I imagine now that we've seen the results of
that "re-imagining," they're even more upset — the two movies
couldn't be more different and yet still retain the same name. But compared to
the book on which the first movie was based — Pierre Boulle's novel LA
PLANÈTE DES SINGES — the shifts in both films are even more radical, and
the resemblances fairly surprising. Let’s begin by looking at the story that
started the apes loping…
LA PLANÈTE DES SINGES
Author: Pierre Boulle
Publisher: René Juillard
Year: 1963
Grade: B+
Journalist Ulysse Mérou accompanies the misanthropic Professor Antelle and
his pupil Arthur Levain on an experimental flight to the Betelgeuse system.
While only two years pass aboard the ship, three and a half centuries pass on
Earth. They land on a planet they name Soror and soon discover that the humans
on the planet are little more than beasts. One of the humans, a beautiful young
woman whom Ulysse names Nova, becomes attached to them. But they soon discover
who the true dominant species is when apes come to hunt for the humans for the
purpose of scientific experimentation — and for sport. Arthur is killed during
the hunt, and Ulysse is separated from Professor Antelle and taken to a research
institute. There, he attracts the attention of a chimpanzee researcher named
Zira, who notices that the new human beast seems to be mimicking simian speech
and actions.
After several degrading experiments, Ulysse manages to convince Zira that he
is a thinking creature, and she quickly teaches him the simian language while he
teaches her French. Despite the machinations of the closed-minded Dr. Zaïus, an
orangutan who represents the official science, Zira and her fiancée Cornélius
encourage Ulysse to make a speech to the annual biological conference. Zaïus
plans to present Ulysse at the conference as a "tame man," but
Ulysse's speech convinces the assembled scientists, and he is given his freedom.
He becomes a celebrity, but it becomes a hollow victory when he discovers that
Professor Antelle has been kept in the zoo and has reverted to an animalistic
state. Ulysse observes the horrors that his "spiritual brothers" are
put through by the apes and comes to believe he has a holy mission to revitalize
humanity on Soror. He becomes even more convinced when, in the course of an
experiment on a human woman's brain, the ape scientists access her race memory
and discover that humans were once the dominant species. Their intellect slowly
devolved through apathy, allowing the apes to mimic their actions and evolve to
their current state. This discovery is supported by a thousand year old
archaeological dig in which Cornélius discovers traces of a human civilization
that predates the simian. Ulysse becomes even more convinced that he has been
sent to return the humans to their previous state.
Before he can make any plans for this holy revolution, he discovers that Nova
is pregnant with his child and that the scientists, headed by the ousted Zaïus,
plan to cut short the threat to simiankind that this baby — and indeed Ulysse
and Nova — represents. Zira and Cornélius arrange to return Ulysse and his
new family to his ship, which is still in orbit around Soror, so that he can
return to Earth. But the outcome of the journey is not what he expects…
The most surprising thing about Boulle's novel is that it's not science
fiction at all. The science fiction elements, in fact, are pretty pulpy,
especially in Xan Fielding's English translation. They're a bit easier to
stomach in the original French, but it's still jarring to hear Ulysse and
Professor Antelle discussing the "rocket" that brings them to Soror,
or how often Ulysse refers to Nova as "one of the loveliest females in the
cosmos." (It's also amusing that Ulysse is so parochially French all the
way through the book, even though he's supposedly from the cosmopolitan era of
2500 AD.) But LA PLANÈTE DES SINGES has more in common with the social
commentary of Jonathan Swift and the scientific pessimism of H. G. Wells than
any of the other science fiction published in the early ‘60s. Boulle's themes
deal with the human pretension of believing that we are at the center of the
universe and with the nature of intelligence. The apes in the book are simply
humans in disguise, with human foibles and fears.
It's also an amazingly chilling satire — at the same time as you're
laughing at the apes' pompous statements that they are the only creatures with
souls, you realize that we've heard these statements before from our own
theologians and philosophers. Just as chilling are the scenes in which Ulysse
watches the brain surgery experiments that allow the apes to discover their
origins. This book should probably be required reading for animal rights
activists — Ulysse's horror at the realization that human scientists have
conducted similar experiments on apes in our world is a pivotal moment in the
book. But the most frightening element of all is the cause of the devolution of
humanity, especially the extremely fast degeneration of the intellectual
Professor Antelle: it's not a lobotomy that removes our intelligence so much as
the simple lack of intellectual activity and the apathy that accompanies such
passivity. Taken as a statement of social criticism, Boulle's novel serves as a
warning: we could easily be superceded by another species and our civilization
ended simply by our own complacency. The book suggests that what has happened on
Soror could happen even to us.
Despite the relative lack of action and the philosophical underpinnings, fans
of the film series will be pleased to find echoes of this book not only in the
first film but in the third, ESCAPE FROM THE PLANET OF THE APES. The
producers of that film must have found the story of Ulysse Mérou's celebrity
irresistible, especially given that the implications surrounding the birth of
Cornelius and Zira's child in the movie are almost exactly the same as those
surrounding the birth of Nova's baby Sirius. (Yes, his name really is Sirius.
It's a very French book, you know.) Reading this book opens up a completely
different view of both the original film series and the new film — even if you
have to read it in translation.
PLANET OF THE APES (1968)
Rated: G
Stars: Charlton Heston, Kim Hunter, Roddy McDowall, Maurice Evans,
James Whitmore, Linda Harrison, James Daly, Buck Kartalian
Writer(s): Michael Wilson, Rod Serling
Director: Franklin J. Schaffner
Grade: A- (as movie); C (as adaptation)
Astronaut George Taylor (Heston) heads up a team of explorers on a one-way
trip into interstellar space. They crash-land on a planet where they discover
humans living in a primitive state. They don't have much time to ponder this
discovery, however, as the apes who comprise the dominant species on the planet
come to hunt down the humans. One of Taylor's party is shot, while another one
is captured. Taylor himself is shot in the throat and is taken to be studied by
zoologist Dr. Zira (Hunter), who realizes there's something different about this
one. Once Taylor's throat heals and he can speak again, he attempts to convince
the apes that he's not a stupid beast like the other humans — but it’s not
as simple as he hopes. Even Zira's fiancée Cornelius (McDowall) takes some
persuading. Orangutan scientist and Defender of the Faith Dr. Zaius (Evans)
realizes the true implications of this human's appearance, however, and attempts
to have him sterilized before he can produce a new race of intelligent humans.
Zira and Cornelius arrange for Taylor to escape and take him into the Forbidden
Zone, where an archaeological dig reveals that apes were not always the dominant
species. Taylor sets out on his own and discovers…well, you know.
Probably the biggest change between this first film version and the book —
and one which has affected even the "re-imagined" version — is the
decision of the original producers to make ape society a relatively primitive
one. Rod Serling's first draft of the script was far more faithful to the book
and presented the apes as being just as advanced as we are. Boulle's ape society
featured advanced brain surgery, cars, planes — even television. But the costs
of the ape makeup and recreating an advanced technological society would have
been too great. The result is that, while the book makes the point that ape
society is as advanced as the human one in most ways while behind us in others,
the movie implies that even at their most advanced, the apes cannot progress
past a certain point. Of course, while they live in Flintstones-style houses and
use wagons for transportation, they have enough metallurgical skill to make
rifles and bullets…
The first film version also dilutes many of the book's philosophical themes
and hunkers down in the social criticism instead — but it's a social criticism
that reflects a particular time period rather than an all-inclusive view of
humanity. PLANET OF THE APES is far more a movie about civil rights than
about the nature of intelligence — bizarre, when you realize that the humans
in the movie really aren't social equals to the apes in any way, shape, or form.
Lines from the original film series like "The only good human is a dead
human" or "All humans look alike to most apes" may mirror the
racist speech of the 1960s, but to suggest that the ethnic groups under fire
during that period are anything like the mindless humans in the film would
itself be racist. Add to this the whole theme of youthful rebellion and never
trusting anyone over 30 and you have a film that only indirectly covers the same
social themes as the novel. It's no wonder Boulle himself objected to the film
so strongly — imagine what he must have thought of the sequels!
In other respects, the film is surprisingly faithful to Boulle's novel. The
interaction between Taylor and Zira is directly taken from the book, and
Taylor's misanthropic character is based on Professor Antelle and his desire to
get away from the fellow humans that he holds in disdain. But showing that
humanity brought about its downfall through the avoidable horrors of nuclear war
and not the unavoidable dumbing down of human culture dilutes Boulle's message,
even as it makes for one of the greatest moments in cinematic history.
PLANET OF THE APES (2001)
Rated: PG-13
Stars: Mark Wahlberg, Tim Roth, Helena Bonham Carter, Michael Clarke
Duncan, Kris Kristofferson, Estella Warren, Paul Giamatti
Writer(s): William Broyles Jr., Lawrence Konner, Mark Rosenthal
Director: Tim Burton
Grade: B- (as movie); D (as adaptation)
Astronaut Leo Davidson (Wahlberg) blasts off into a zone of unstable space to
rescue a trained chimpanzee and ends up crash-landing on a planet where sentient
humans are hunted by apes and turned into slaves. After earning the animosity of
General Thade (Roth) and gaining the trust of human rights activist Ari (Bonham
Carter), Leo escapes and soon discovers the secret of how the apes became the
dominant species. With the help of Ari and human slave Daena (Warren), Leo
persuades his fellow humans to rise up against their oppressors as he tries to
find a way back to his own time and space.
It's obvious, even without giving much more of the plot away, that the new
film has just as little to do with Boulle's novel as it does with the original
film. Ironically, it's far more of a film about civil rights than the first one,
despite the continued watering down of the plot elements. And yet the real
surprise is that certain elements of Boulle's novel that the original film
ignored are taken up here. Taylor, for instance, could care less about the
treatment of his fellow humans — he just wants to get away from the damned
dirty apes. Leo, on the other hand, acts as the same sort of savior for this
pack of humans that Ulysse hoped to be in the novel. The strange romantic
triangle between Ulysse, Zira, and Cornélius in the book is recreated here in
the equally bizarre triangle between Leo, Ari, and Daena. But most amazingly,
the surprise ending — which has garnered a great deal of negative criticism
and which usually causes film audiences to laugh rather than gasp in horror —
is the part that most directly follows the book. The biggest problem is that,
since the rest of the film has so little to do with the book, tacking that
ending onto this film robs the surprise of all its impact.
We could hope that the second film could use that last scene as an
opportunity to go back and incorporate more elements from the plot of the book.
Unfortunately, that's not the way Hollywood works. Until someone gets enough
capital (and interest) together to make a mini-series based on the novel —
which would be the best way to present that material to its fullest — there's
only one way to completely enjoy Boulle's original vision: learn to read French.
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