Battle for the Planet of the Apes (1973)

One decade after a worldwide series of ape revolutions and a brutal nuclear war among humans, Caesar must protect survivors of both species from an insidious human cult and a militant ape faction alike.Screenwriters John William Corrington and Joyce Hooper Corrington were brought in after the success of their film "The Omega Man", although prior to that neither one of them had written any science fiction films and, indeed, Joyce Carrington later admitted they had never seen any of the Apes films prior to being hired to write the script for "Battle".Roger Ebert gave the film a negative review, stating, "Battle looks like the last gasp of a dying series, a movie made simply to wring the dollars out of any remaining ape fans." As usual, Ebert is spot on. This feels nothing like an "Apes" movie at all, and the continuity starts to get a little strange. Even ignoring the paradox of the time loop, there is no explanation of how the apes became able to speak and so forth. If Caesar had a mate and this was 500 years in the future it might make sense, but apes simply do not have the ability to speak!

After the thrilling conclusion to "Conquest of the Planet of the Apes", it seemed as if the Apes tale had come full circle. Yet, for whatever reason, a final sequel was made on a shoe-string budget, featuring a plot that, while still interesting, was not worthy to end such an epic series. Sadly, then, "Battle for the Planet of the Apes" sends the series out with a whimper, not a bang.For a basic plot summary, "Battle" sees a society some years down the road where Caesar (Roddy McDowell) rules a rather primitive Ape City. Humans are basically just workers in this society, yet are treated generally kindly by Caesar. As usual, however, gorilla General Aldo (Claude Akins) proves to be a war-monger who challenges the "ape must not kill ape" supreme law. When a pocket of human survivors (after the fallout of their first usage of nuclear weapons against the apes) decide to challenge Ape City in one final duel, the future of human/ape relations lies in the balance.There are many people who think that "Battle" is a terrible entry into this series and not even worthy of being mentioned in the same breath as the others. I won't go so far as to say that. It is easily the weakest sequel, but that isn't to say that it doesn't have some redeeming value. McDowell gives another marvelous performance as Caesar, while the "ape politics" stuff is pretty good as well.The trouble with "Battle", however, is that it is just so cheaply made. Whereas the other films had an "epic" feel to them, this one (right from the very beginning) seems not so much a labor of love as just a plain labor. There are no interesting visuals, the cinematography is dark/bleak, and the plot is stretched thin even with just an hour-and-a-half runtime. Like many other reviewers have said, "Battle" seems like a TV pilot more than something one is used to seeing up on the big screen.Thus, "Battle for the Planet of the Apes" is a very conflicted film. It deals with many vital themes central to the "Apes" canon, yet at the same time does not provide nearly the type of heading that Ape-heads (the only ones watching by this point) were looking for. Watch it for what it is, but expect to be let down after the emotional high of "Conquest".

As a child of the 70's my imagination was ignited by the Planet of the Apes series. I saw Battle at a drive in...and when my parents refused to take me back for a second viewing I behaved in a way that makes me cringe to remember. But this is extent the film had on my young mind. It was only until recent that I learned of the negative response which seems a little extreme. It is obvious that the budget made the film look a little cheap and the story is a bit thin but the characters still make up for these flaws and still has plenty of dramatic moments.I don't hold the opinion that Battle is the worst of the series. I am of the opinion that Beneath is my least favorite and one I rarely re watched and seems like a rehash of the first with only a few slight variations. It is the one that captures my imagination the least. It is Conquest which I think is by far the best and the most satirical.Battle should not be so quickly dismissed because of it's limitations. The performances are pretty solid and everyone gets a chance to have a dramatic moment. Perhaps the message of the film can be seen as bit heavy handed by a modern audience and certainly could have been explored deeper had it not been for those limitations. It can come across as just a routine action flick between the survivors of a greater war and now just beginning to rebuild their own cultures. The human mutants are very superficial and one-dimensional. They are the bad guys of the story with the obligatory final confrontation. Over all it is a satisfying conclusion ending to the original series---warts and all.

It's 12 years after the conquest in the previous movie. This is the 5th and last of the original apes movies. Caesar (Roddy McDowall) rules Ape City trying to live in peace with the second class humans. There are two main rules. Apes do not kill apes. Humans are not allowed to say No to apes. Caesar is married to Lisa with a son named Cornelius. His human assistant MacDonald tells Caesar about an archive in the ruined city. They travel to the radioactive city with orangutan Virgil and find Cornelius and Zira's testimony predicting the end of the world by the gorillas in the 3rd movie 'Escape from the Planet of the Apes'. The surviving irradiated humans chase them away. Gorilla general Aldo is barely literate and plots to overthrow Casesar. Human survivors led by Governor Kolp attack the apes.The story isn't too bad but the battle fails the movie. There are problems in tone especially considering the humans are now second class citizens. The movie is able to mostly finesse that problem. The ruin city is weak. It's no more than a bunch of industrial sets. There are some other weaknesses but it's the battle that is truly weak. The humans walking up to Ape City is silly. The apes winning by ape combat is even sillier. The franchise is no more than a B-movie series aiming to wring the last few bucks.