Two of the most brilliantly sophisticated visual filmmakers of all time doing both a satirical, historical wartime comedy of manners and a deeply expressive, romantic and painful portrait of the passage of time. And yet, it's all a bit... British (derogatory), innit?
[35mm]
First and foremost, just happy to be back and hanging out with all my little monkey buddies. This one in particular though made me think about that James Cameron Planet of the Apes movie that never happened, in some negative ways (there can only be one Jim) but also a number of positive ones.
That is obviously in part because this was scripted by Cameron collaborator Josh Friedman who has been deep in the Avatar sequel trenches helping him conceive…
Talked about in full alongside Planet of the Apes (1968) on the latest patron-exclusive, bonus episode of my genre/exploitation film podcast SLEAZOIDS, which you can access over on our Patreon by clicking here.
Subscribing to our Patreon gains you access to this episode, all previous bonus eps (162!! You can see all the films covered so far here) and all future bonus eps (2 more every single month!!). You can listen to all of our 166 free episodes over on Soundcloud, Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
Talked about in full alongside Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970) on the latest patron-exclusive, bonus episode of my genre/exploitation film podcast SLEAZOIDS, which you can access over on our Patreon by clicking here.
Subscribing to our Patreon gains you access to this episode, all previous bonus eps (162!! You can see all the films covered so far here) and all future bonus eps (2 more every single month!!). You can listen to all of our 166 free episodes over on Soundcloud, Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
And with this my great Ape rewatch comes to an end, the only one I am disappointed to have almost no affection for outside of the amazing Rick Baker make-up FX work which I would love for these moves to return back to at some point. Last seen when I was 10 years old and the very idea of Tim Burton making a subpar movie and ruining his streak as the best director of all time was unthinkable. There are…
Too cheaply made to realize it to the more effective action movie degree it probably should've been and trying to suppress the gruesome and bummer tone of J. Lee Thompson's last crack at these movies and deliver something more conventional was a mistake, but what can I say? I love the monkey and I love these weird, flawed movies. I like the idea of the apes trying to figure out what their "ape shall not kill ape" laws are going…
An improvement on Saint Maud by sheer virtue of carving out its own genuine weirdo, punk identity instead of slotting itself so snugly into an A24 "art"-horror package, but still left this feeling that the ambition of its impressively stylish genre-bending poses—of the white trash neon-noir and grisly body(builder) horror variety—were a bit underserved by its stock dysfunctional (crime) family and romance scripting. Stewart and O’Brian admirably provide some legit sexual chemistry and impulsive, volatile energy to their Bound-esque lesbian…
My first experience with the strange and independent stylings of DIY grindhouse-meets-home-movie filmmaker Ray Dennis Steckler, infamous for working with no resources or scripts and simply running on pure improvised outsider artist imagination and passion.
This is nearly entirely made up of footage of him and his friends walking around Long Beach, riding roller coasters, hanging out at an amusement park midway, checking out the creepy décor and watching various open mic song, dance and comedy performances that he somehow…
Somehow was unaware that Dr. Seuss wrote a lavish MGM-style Technicolor fantasy musical that for some reason was given the full weight and resources of the Stanley Kramer production house, and was so dark and deranged in terms of its post-war commentary that it was slashed in half from its original preview cut into a more sentimental family film package that still retains many of its odd and creepy details.
The final result, similarly to The Wizard of Oz, is…
So sick that Roger Avary and Neil Gaiman wrote the Excalibur of grotesque, uncanny dark fantasy monster fighting PlayStation cut scene cinema and Robert Zemeckis's central contribution is not just the graphically violent and horny mocap CG animation that makes it look like Zack Snyder's Shrek but also filling it with Austin Powers dick hiding gags. A movie designed in a lab to get 3 stars out of Roger Ebert by distracting him into writing multiple paragraphs about Angelina Jolie. For good or ill, no one cay say for sure, never again will $150m be put into character designs by a senior VeggieTales animator.
Still my favorite of this new run of Apes movies by simple virtue of how well it manages to communicate its moral ambiguity and misanthropic pessimism through genuinely expressive control of tone and performance, and because of how Reeves coming in as a for-hire engineer smartly opts to not just make the best sections of Rise its primary focus (where Caesar and his dramatically sensitive relationship with humans is tested against the instinctual push towards righteously organizing his own tribal…
Talked about in full alongside Twisted Issues (1988) on the latest patron-exclusive, bonus episode of my genre/exploitation film podcast SLEAZOIDS, which you can access over on our Patreon by clicking here.
Subscribing to our Patreon gains you access to this episode, all previous bonus eps (161!! You can see all the films covered so far here) and all future bonus eps (2 more every single month!!). You can listen to all of our 165 free episodes over on Soundcloud, Apple Podcasts or Spotify.