Welcome back to Movie Shortens.
Follow us today to a movie titled: Planet Of The Apes.
Be aware, there are spoilers!
The movie begins with the captain of a spaceship sitting at its helm as it hurtles through
space.
As he, Taylor, puffs on a cigar, he reflects that on the crew’s return to Earth - some
six months after they left it - it will have aged around 700 years while they will have
hardly aged at all.
He also ponders, we assume for the benefit of people listening back on Earth, whether
they will still be at war with each other and mistreating each other.
With his crew already in a deep sleep in sealed-off chambers, he injects himself in the arm and
joins them.
With the crew still fast asleep, we soon witness the ship descending towards a barren planet
at speed, seemingly out of control.
It eventually crash-lands on a flat, still body of water, awakening those on board.
As the confused and now bearded male members of the team clamber quickly from their beds,
water gushing into the ship, they notice that the only female member of the crew, Stewart,
has not made it - she has aged incredibly and died en route.
The men set about trying to save themselves, with Taylor attempting to restart the ship
and Dodge climbing up a ladder to test whether or not the atmosphere is safe and breathable.
It is.
So, unable to get the ship up and run again and the water beginning to sink it, the guys
grab a few essentials and abandon it, hopping into the water and making their exit in a
small, round, yellow rubber dingy.
As they paddle away, the third member of the crew - the rather serious Landon - counts
down the ship’s final seconds before it descends below the surface.
Upon finding a suitable place to land, Dodge quickly gets to work testing the soil while
Landon looks out over the lake deep in thought - he is thinking about Stewart.
Unsympathetic Taylor points out Landon has gone grey.
As Dodge declares the soil incapable of sustaining any life, Landon marks their landing spot
with a small American flag.
Taylor, meanwhile, laughs at this and chooses the entirely random direction in which they
will head.
They have enough food and water for only three days.
Still clad in their spacesuits, the group marches across the lifeless terrain ascending
rocky outcrops and descending steep, grey, sandy slopes.
At one point, they are forced to run as a loose boulder rolls down a hill in their direction.
At this point, clearly tired and thirsty, they contemplate a drink but decide to save
the remaining fluid instead.
Then, as Dodge forges ahead, Taylor and Landon begin to argue with Taylor mocking Landon
for wanting to be a hero and restating the fact that everything they ever knew on Earth
would, by now, be long dead and buried.
Dodge yells out excitedly to them from a vantage point that’s well ahead of the others and
significantly higher.
Taylor and Landon pick up the pace, and we soon witness the three of them gathered around
a tiny plant, which they pluck from the ground.
Where there is one, there will be many more they assert and head off searching for them.
Now venturing down a path lined by an increasing number of plants, bushes, and trees, the group
are - unbeknownst to them - being followed as we observe the silhouettes of those watching
them atop some steep rocks nearby.
Having spotted some rather sinister-looking scarecrows up there, the group begins to make
their way up but is quickly distracted by the sound of a waterfall.
They run towards it, clearly dirty and parched from their lengthy journey, flinging off their
clothes and diving in.
They swim around gleefully, still unaware of their hidden observers.
At that very moment, they spot footprints in a sandbank at the edge of the pool.
Their possessions are being stolen by the errant hands of those that had been flanking
them.
They spot this and give chase, noticing along the way that very little has been discarded.
However, they manage to pick up and put on at least some of their clothes which have
been cut up and partially destroyed.
The chase leads them to a field where a large group of primitive-looking, long-haired, only
partially dressed people gather food.
While Landon remarks that they’re unlucky to have landed in a place that’s seen such
little advancement, Taylor laughs it off and suggests they could soon be running the site.
At this moment, panic ensues, and the hordes of people begin to run from the field, pursued,
we soon discover, by what appear to be gorillas, many of which are on horseback, armed with
sticks and guns.
The crew also attempts to flee, but Dodge is shot to death trying to escape the field.
Taylor can hide among the crops nearby.
Landon is initially able to get away but is soon captured in a net, as Taylor has been
shot in the neck.
The apes are clearly on a mission to either kill or capture the humans, and as Taylor
is carried into a camp, bound to a stick, and placed in a caged carriage, we see several
other humans strung upside down, hanging from their ankles.
Here, in captivity, he first makes eye contact with the striking female human he will later
name Nova.
Taylor is transported to what appears to be a hospital and is next seen undergoing treatment
while two chimpanzees discuss both his fate and the nature of their work.
While the doctor tending to Taylor’s injury appears irritated and frustrated in his work
and disgusted at the dirtiness of the human, his companion Dr. Zira is more sympathetic.
Her job, it seems, is to study the brains of humans.
Having recovered much of his strength, Taylor is transferred to a cell and is visited by
Zira who appears to be fascinated by him.
As she engages in a conversation about him, he attempts to contribute to it but cannot
speak due to his injury.
His observers, nevertheless, notice he is trying to form words.
Though this fascinates Zira, it is quickly dismissed by her superior, Dr. Zaius, an orangutan,
who claims Taylor is merely mimicking their actions.
In a series of subsequent interactions, Taylor attempts to write messages to Zira, one of
which reaches her on a piece of paper he stole from her.
She has learned his name.
The other humans, it has become apparent, can neither write nor speak, but despite this,
we sense a growing affection between Nova and Taylor, who Zira presents to him as a
gift as they begin to share a cage.
With Zira’s interest in Taylor - who she prefers to call Bright Eyes - now piqued,
she brings her fiancé Cornelius to see him.
Cornelius, we find out, is intrigued as he has been involved in archeological work and
believes a previously advanced human civilization to have preexisted their current ape one.
This, he notes, suggests that men could, potentially, be domesticated.
He is quickly shut down and warned by Dr. Zaius, who consistently maintains mankind
to be incapable of order and inherently combative.
Zira and Cornelius are further intrigued when Taylor makes a paper airplane, and they watch
it fly across the room as he attempts to convince him that flight is possible and that his story
is indeed the truth.
His plan and their interest is once again quashed by Dr. Zaius, who also suggests that
he plans to have Taylor castrated.
Taylor quickly realizes his only hope is to escape and manages to do so, but though he
flees through, over, and between many buildings, he cannot get away from his captures.
During this pursuit, he also witnesses Dodge’s stuffed corpse in a museum.
Having been detained once again, we soon find Taylor in a courtroom, with Zira and Cornelius
attempting to defend him against a group of judges led by Zaius.
Unable to speak for himself, Taylor writes down his story, which is laughed off and dismissed
by the judges.
We learn this society is founded on some ancient, sacred scripts and, as a man, Taylor is judged
according to these.
Though suspicious of Taylor’s story, Zaius pushes him to reveal more, concerned that
a rival group of men live in a distant forest on the other side of the forbidden zone from
which Taylor emerged, and maybe a threat to the ape kingdom.
However, he gives Taylor a chance to prove other humans are capable of communication
by leading him, along with the other members of the court, to meet the other people with
whom Taylor was captured.
Here we get our final glimpse of Landon, who has a big scar on the side of his head and
has been operated on, depriving him now of both awareness and speech.
Realizing the situation is now hopeless, and with the help of her nephew Lucius, that night,
Zira frees Taylor, who insists on bringing Nova with them.
The group makes their getaway on horseback.
Once free of the settlement, Taylor takes one of their guns and asserts his independence.
The gang of them head for the cave Cornelius had previously been excavating in the forbidden
zone, convinced that the evidence there can prove his theory in contradiction of the scripts
and save them.
As Taylor sits on the beach shaving, much to the bafflement of the others, Zaius and
a group of guards catch up to them.
During a brief gunfight, Taylor is able to take the senior orangutan hostage, causing
the gorillas to back off.
At this point, Cornelius leads Zaius into the cave desperate to convince him of his
theories on mankind.
Zaius remains cynical though and is unwilling to accept any explanation for the discoveries
therein, even though Taylor is able to explain the use and purpose of many of the artifacts,
an artificial heart valve included.
It seems they may be on the cusp of a breakthrough when they discover the human doll has been
designed to say ‘mama’ as Taylor asserts, ‘why would an ape make a human doll that
could speak.’
Gunfire from outside ruins the moment, though, as the group emerges to check on Lucias.
In this, the final showdown, Taylor gags and binds his hostage, Dr. Zaius, who is in the
midst of this.
He admits he has long known of this previous human world and discourages Taylor from uncovering
more information about it.
Unperturbed, Taylor heads off on horseback with Nova, leaving those that freed him at
the mercy of Zaius and the gorillas.
They are immediately arrested, with Zaius instructing the gorillas to blow up the entrance
to the cave to hide the evidence.
Taylor and Nova, meanwhile, are seen trotting along a beach in the shadow of the remains
of the Statue of Liberty.
Our hero breaks down in tears of anger, despair and frustration now knowing he has made it
home, a home that was entirely destroyed by mankind.
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