tim burton has now completed his evolution from the brilliant director of macabre stories about outcast individuals yearning for acceptance , and into a studio monkey whose name is used as part of multi - tiered marketing materials for crap movies . and here he hits rock bottom , with planet of the apes .
i did n't expect much from this latest " interpretation " of pierre boulle 's classic novel planet of the apes .
i mean , how could you top the force and impact of the original film , intelligently co - scripted by rod serling ( of twilight zone fame ) combined with the overbearing chuck heston growling and yelling at those " damn dirty apes , " in one of his best roles of his career ?
sadly
, i sat down to watch burton 's version of planet of the apes and within the first 20 minutes ,
i was checking my watch and my girlfriend ( a big fan of the original film ) started to nod off .
this time around , the story plays out like a cross between enemy mine , braveheart , and project x .
marky mark wahlberg , who was enjoyable in boogie nights and the corrupter , plays leo davidson , a hot shot u . s .
air force pilot .
leo and his crew are in search of some mysterious magnetic storms ( no real explanation given in the film ) and leo sends one of his genetically altered " smart " chimps into the storms to collect data .
leo and his crew lose communication with the chimp , leo hops in another ship to find the monkey , and then he 's thrown through some type of time - space wormhole which crashes lands on the twentieth century fox studio backlot , all mocked up to look like the amazon jungle .
leo ends up getting captured by a group of talking apes and is sold to a slave trader named limbo ( paul giamatti ) who in turn sells leo to a chimpanzee named ari ( helena bonham carter ) .
the kind ari then helps leo and his fellow humans escape to the mountains to find leo 's ship .
along the way , monkeys played by tim roth ( overacting his role of a vicious general named thade ) and michael clarke duncan ( who further enhances his career by playing another heavy in a bad action movie ) strive out to hunt down leo and his band of human savages , just like battlefield earth !
in the end , it all culminates into another braveheart rip - off human versus ape battle scene .
while rick baker 's makeup work is amazing ,
the script is a pathetic hodgepodge
( courtesy of three writers ) ,
the acting is horrible , and the " surprise " ending feels like a swing from a ball - peen hammer into the temple .
wahlberg does not have the physical or mental presence of a chuck heston to carry the film or any of its action sequences .
this remake , or re - interpretation , as tim burton has proclaimed it , is an insult to the intelligence and wit of the original film .
the ethical arguments about the equality of species , fascism , and military buildup have been replaced by tremendous amounts of ridiculous dialogue , an unimaginative narrative structure , and a romance between a monkey and a human .
even chuck heston 's anti - gun tirade ( in the de rigeur cameo ) seems shallow and jokey .
but the main element missing from this tim burton film is tim burton .
even though his name is plastered across every billboard in america , john badham could have directed this film .
even joel schumacher could have directed this film .
he probably should have .
burton 's predominant themes of rejection , isolation , and the search for one 's place in the universe , as seen in ed wood , edward scissorshands , and pee - wee 's big adventure , are completely absent in this planet .
i suppose that 's what happen when a great director gets sucked through a wormhole .
i was checking my watch sadly the " surprise " ending feels like a swing from a ball - peen hammer into the temple he hits rock bottom it all culminates into another braveheart rip - off tremendous amounts of ridiculous dialogue , an unimaginative narrative structure an insult to the intelligence and wit of the original film started to nod off the acting is horrible a studio monkey whose name is used as part of multi - tiered marketing materials for crap movies the script is a pathetic hodgepodge