Movie Review: Battle for the Planet of the Apes (1973)

Battle for the Planet of the Apes (1973): The final installment of the original series sees Caesar, now in charge of the apes, maintaining the peace following a nuclear war that's destroyed cities and basically fucked everything right up. Despite going a bit mental at the end of the last one, he's generally an alright leader. Humans seem to work alongside the apes, although they probably don't have complete equality as is pointed out quite quickly. Eventually the apes come into conflict with surviving humans and contrasting methods between the various ape subcultures come to the forefront, which really form the central theme of this film. A lot of it is based around the key ape law, which states that while humans kill humans, an ape may never kill another ape. Introduced in this film is the militaristic brute gorilla Aldo (referenced in the previous film, "the ape that said no") who is particularly trigger-happy and human-hating. This contrasts greatly with Caesar's pacifistic way of life.

I'll get the good points out first: This is done fairly well, and one of the final scenes where Aldo and Caesar DO BATTLE is actually fairly gripping. However, that's one of the only good things I can say. To say this sequel was limp doesn't cover it. It's just boring, boring, boring. And by boring, I mean really boring. Bereft of excitement. Have a sleep in the middle, you'll have a blast. It was clearly made for no money whatsoever, seemingly based in one campsite for the majority of the film, and by this point in the series the novelty of human beings having a skirmish with apes involving guns and nets is incredibly hackneyed. The dialogue is pretty lame and Caesar's son Cornelius (these names are just cyclical, just get reused every few generations) is the Scrappy Doo of the series, i.e. the annoying little cunt. At least this Cornelius had the courtesy to die, Scrappy never even gave us that pleasure. Two thumbs down.

This does put me in a quandary, because this film is no good. However, is it worse than the second in the series, Beneath the Planet of the Apes? Beneath had Charlton Heston but it also had incomprehensible science-fiction mumbo jumbo I believe the cast improvised on the spot. This one had apes doing battle atop a giant tree but it had absolutely nothing else of any worth. I'm edging towards Beneath being the worst of the series because it really annoyed me.

Final series rankings (best to worst): Planet of the Apes, Escape from the Planet of the Apes, Conquest of the Planet of the Apes, Battle for the Planet of the Apes, Beneath the Planet of the Apes.