Most of you
know the story. An astronaut crash lands on earth and discovers
that apes
and humans have switched roles. He is captured,
escapes and tries to get back to "safety." I tried
to avoid reviewing this film but I couldn't resist because the
entire genre of "Planet of the Apes" is a classic. Why? Because
any movie that represents White peoples worst nightmare is gonna
be a classic. And thats what this movie is. White peoples worst
nightmare. An astronaut gets up and goes to work one day and he
comes home to find the planet taken over by apes (non white people)
with the humans being treated like niggers.
Leo Davidson
(Mark Wahlberg) is an astronaut on a space station where monkeys
are being trained
to fly into space storms, these
monkeys have been genetically engineered to be "smarter." Leo's
monkey "Pericles" is lost in the space storm on one of
these missions and Leo takes off to rescue "his monkey." The
storm swallows Leo and takes him through time to a planet where
he crash lands right in the middle of an ape slaving expedition.
He gets captured along with several other humans and is taken to
ape city where he is sold to a slave trader.(I think he's supposed
to be "Jewish" but thats another story)
On this planet instead of White Supremacy, you have Ape Supremacy;
the good thing about this movie is all the humans are treated like
niggers, both Black
and White. The bad thing is that even here, the light colored apes are superior
to the darker ones (so much for getting around White Supremacy). The movie
tries to portray what Black people deal with concerning racism and slavery,
but it does a poor job of both. For starts, I would have shown Humans selling
other humans to the apes for liquor and guns, the white female having sex with
the male apes in exchange for better treatment, the darker humans being used
as "house humans" to create conflict and confusion...All the strategies
of "divide and conquer" should have been demonstrated so we could
finally put an end to White people blaming Black people for their mistreatment
under White Supremacy.
Anyway, Leo escapes with the help of a few "House Apes," rallies
the humans and sets the stage for a climactic battle between the rag tag humans
and the ape stormtroopers. Interspersed between all of this are silly scenes
of ape hygiene and ape sex play that could have been left out. In one ridiculous
scene, an ape says a prayer and at the end of it says "amen" instead
of "a-ape." Maybe this was put in to demonstrate what I have termed
the "White Jesus Factor." Thats the "oppressor as God" phenomenon
that is the last obstacle to mental emancipation. When my Mom died last year
The funeral was at the same church I was baptized in. And wouldn't you know
it, that same White Jesus was still up there, all the White people have left
the neighborhood but the White Jesus is still there. No wonder my Mom didn't
want to live anymore. (Please pardon my digression)
So the final battle commences, hand to hand combat, apes against
humans. Neither side seems to have the upper hand when all of the
sudden there's a flash in the sky. A space ship lands and all the
fighting stops. The hatch opens and we see Pericles, the chimp Leo
had been training. Now according to the ape bible, all apes trace
their linage back to the "first ape"; an ape prophet who
came from the sky long, long ago and according to prophecy would
return one day to initiate peace and justice. When the apes see Pericles,
they think he's the prophet and all bow down to him in reverence.
It appears that all is well now. Apes and humans will live in peace
and justice. No one will be mistreated.
Leo gets on the space ship and blasts off. On the way out he runs into the
same storm he hit on the way in. He comes through it and crash lands on earth
at the Lincoln memorial in Washington, DC. He gets out of the capsule and the
first thing he sees is the statue of Abraham Lincoln, but he has simian features-he
looks like a monkey! At the same time DC police, FBI, SWAT... all show up and
they are gorillas too!
And thats how it ends. A lone White man surrounded by apes...With guns and
helicopters!
I told you it was White peoples worst nightmare. Leo was invited to stay with
the apes and humans and work to create a "Just society" but he had
to get back to White Supremacy. His landing in the capitol of the "United
States of Apes" was a "White wake up call" designed to remind
White people not to ever leave White Supremacy to "chance," because
if you do, it might just get replaced by something worse, not better. It might
get replaced with "Black Supremacy" and not Justice.
Many people say this movie was not as good as the original, thats true, but
it didn't hafta be. The message to White people was what worked. And that message
was: If White Supremacy ever ends, your future will end with it.