Some ape movies are more equal than others

Tim Burton's 2001 remake of PLANET OF THE APES was aired on TV again at the weekend. If you watched it, I probably owe you an apology.

First of all, the fact that there are so many people out there like me who love the original movie (aka THE GREATEST FILM EVER MADE) and the franchise it spawned probably convinced Twentieth Century Fox that there was some kind of demand for a remake, while forgetting everything that made the original special. I can just about buy into an argument for remaking rubbish films but it's a mystery to me why anyone thinks that undisputed classics need to be "reimagined" for a new generation.

Secondly, I knew in advance that it was going to be screening and yet I didn't warn you off it, so again I apologise. There is very little I can say to comfort you or to erode the feelings of disappointment and anger that you are probably still feeling if you wasted a couple of valuable hours of your life on this steaming puddle of rancid pish.

There are so many things wrong with this picture it's difficult to know where to begin. Let's start at the conception. Even assuming there was a legitimate reason to remake it (there wasn't, but let's just go with it), Fox went about it all wrong from the start. After several scripts were penned and rejected over many, many years what eventually got the greenlight doesn't appear to have been any better. It's difficult to tell though, since it apparently went through a hefty rewrite on its way to the screen.

While I've admired several of Tim Burton's films, there is no escaping the fact that he is more at home with visuals than a decent script. He was hampered further by various inspired choices by the studio, not least of which was adhering to the ever more popular policy of fixing a release date and working towards it rather than making a good film and then releasing it. Fox even retained Dick Zanuck as producer (one of the many links to the original film) but as the documentary BEHIND THE PLANET OF THE APES revealed, he was just about the only person involved who didn't realise what the original film was about.

Small wonder then that we ended up with such an embarrassing mess. Burton's film couldn't be considered good by any means, but when compared to the original film that inspired it its shortfalls become painfully obvious.

The original film's lead was Charlton Heston, a respected actor who had already appeared in the likes of BEN-HUR, THE TEN COMMANDMENTS, EL CID and numerous other classics. The remake gave us the two-dimensional Mark Wahlberg, who was famous for fronting a tripe 80s pop group and sporting a prosthetic knob in BOOGIE NIGHTS.

The original had specially-devised make-up effects that earned John Chambers an honorary Oscar. Despite the assumed leaps forward in technology, the remake gave us appliances that hindered the actors' abilities to speak properly or to express themselves. They even managed to make Helena Bonham-Carter's chimp look like Michael Jackson.

The original had support from the likes of Roddy McDowall, Maurice Evans and Kim Hunter. The remake gave us Paul Giamatti clowning around as some kind of comic relief slave trader, Tim Roth trying his best not to look like he was in a pantomime and a cringeworthy cameo by Heston.

The original made full use of the desert locations and the Fox ranch to create an alien world and an exotic looking ape city. The ape city in the remake never resembled anything other than a soundstage, and a cramped one at that.

The humour in the original was, for the most part, perfectly judged. The attempts at humour in the remake were embarrassing to a whole new degree.

The original had an incredibly innovative score by Jerry Goldsmith that used things like mixing bowls and brass instruments with inverted mouthpieces in order to create an alien world. For the remake, Danny Elfman managed a half decent main title followed by a lot of by-the-numbers music that he himself has frequently done better than.

The original had a superb script by Rod Serling (creator of THE TWILIGHT ZONE) and Michael Wilson, which actually brought some social commentary to the table (try watching the trial scene in the original movie knowing that Wilson had run afoul of McCarthy's witchhunts in the 1950s). The remake gave us Marky Mark fighting monkeys and, er, I can't actually remember him doing much else.

The original benefited from expert pacing by director Franklin Schaeffner, with the slow build up used to introduce us to the strange new world and establish the character of Taylor. Burton's effort has an idiotic astronaut chase a monkey (sorry, ape) into space and within a few minutes is fighting with apes. And after that opening act of folly on the part of whatever Wahlberg's character was called I really wanted the apes to win.

The original gave us numerous quotes that have lived on long after the film disappeared from theatres. The remake was so barren of anything memorable that the things one remembers most are the numerous occasions it references the original movie - unfortunately, rather than demonstrating a smug but fond feeling for the original, it only serves to remind you how much better the original was.

The original gave us the single greatest ending in the history of movies. For the remake, Burton decided to film an ending that was far closer to Pierre Boulle's original novel - alas, he failed to realise that it actually had sod all to do with the film that had preceded it, leaving everyone walking out the cinema wondering what the hell happened. Imagine if you were watching CITIZEN KANE and were just about to discover what "Rosebud" meant... and then suddenly someone switches the film and you get the last five minutes of BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN. That's the feeling you get watching the conclusion to Burton's nadir.

I imagine this must be what die hard STAR WARS fans felt like when George Lucas finally unveiled his second trilogy, in particular the first two parts. Thrilled to finally see the films you love continuing on the big screen after so long, you approach the cinema in an optimistic mood and leave with a smile on your face, kidding yourself on that what you just witnessed actually delivered the goods. It's only once the smell of popcorn has left your nostrils and you've grown accustomed to daylight once more that you begin to get a nagging feeling at the back of your mind. That feeling grows until sometime later - maybe hours, maybe days, maybe even a couple of weeks - you begin to be honest with yourself and admit that what you saw was really not very good at all. All the wishing in the world will not make an awful film suddenly turn good.

I could go on forever talking about the ways in which the original movie far outshines its modern usurper, but I won't. I'll just finish by apologising again and offering you one piece of advice to get over it.

Nowadays whenever I tell anyone that my favourite film is PLANET OF THE APES, there's an uncomfortable few seconds where I have to explain that I'm talking about the original and, if necessary, instruct them to watch it, just in case they're basing their opinion on the more recent turkey.

So that's the advice I offer you. Go and watch the original again. Even better, maybe you're lucky enough to have never seen the original, in which case don't let the "reimagining" monstrosity put you off - you're in for a treat. Just as wishing won't make an awful film turn good, even Burton's cinematic equivalent of electrodes to the testicles can't change the fact that the original is THE GREATEST FILM EVER MADE. EVER.