Escape from the Planet of the Apes (1971)

Director:

Don Taylor

Writers:

Paul Dehn (written by)
Pierre Boulle (characters creator)

Release Date:

21 May 1971 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Sci-Fi

Tagline:

Meet baby Milo who has Washington terrified.

Plot:

The world is shocked by the appearance of two talking chimpanzees, who arrived mysteriously in a U.S. spacecraft. They become the toast of society; but one man believes them to be a threat to the human race.

Plot Keywords:

Ape | Fear | Future | Spaceship | Spacecraft

Cast

Roddy McDowall	...	Cornelius
Kim Hunter	...	Zira
Bradford Dillman	...	Dr. Lewis Dixon
Natalie Trundy	...	Dr. Stephanie Branton
Eric Braeden	...	Dr. Otto Hasslein
Ricardo Montalban	...	Armando
William Windom	...	The President
Sal Mineo	...	Milo
Albert Salmi	...	E-1
Jason Evers	...	E-2
John Randolph	...	Commission Chairman
Harry Lauter	...	Gen. Winthrop
M. Emmet Walsh	...	Aide
Roy Glenn	...	Lawyer (as Roy E. Glenn Sr.)
Peter Forster	...	Cardinal
Norman Burton	...	Army Officer
William Woodson	...	Naval Officer
Tom Lowell	...	Orderly
Gene Whittington	...	Marine Captain
Donald Elson	...	Curator
Bill Bonds	...	TV Newscaster
Army Archerd	...	Referee
James Bacon	...	Gen. Faulkner
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
John Alderman	...	Marine Corporal (uncredited)
Paul Bradley	...	Man at President's Briefing (uncredited)
Karl Bruck	...	German Newscaster (uncredited)
Sam Chew Jr.	...	Undetermined (uncredited)
Walker Edmiston	...	Talking Baby Chimp (voice) (uncredited)
James W. Gavin	...	Helicopter Pilot (uncredited)
George Golden	...	Man at President's Briefing (uncredited)
Joe Gray	...	Bodyguard (uncredited)
Robert Gunner	...	Landon (archive footage) (uncredited)
Elizabeth Harrower	...	Reporter at Hotel (uncredited)
Robert Nichols	...	Reporter (uncredited)
Ron Pinkard	...	Undetermined (uncredited)
Janos Prohaska	...	Heloise (uncredited)
Tony Regan	...	Reporter at Hotel (uncredited)
Stephen Roberts	...	Gen. Brody (uncredited)
Hank Robinson	...	White Haired Reporter (uncredited)
James Sikking	...	Control Room Officer (uncredited)
Arthur Tovey	...	White-Haired Man at President's Briefing (uncredited)

Directed by
Don Taylor

Writing credits
Paul Dehn		(written by)
Pierre Boulle		(characters creator)

Produced by
Frank Capra Jr.	....	associate producer
Arthur P. Jacobs	....	producer

Original Music by
Jerry Goldsmith

Cinematography by
Joseph F. Biroc		(director of photography) (as Joseph Biroc)

Film Editing by
Marion Rothman

Art Direction by
William J. Creber		(as William Creber)
Jack Martin Smith

Set Decoration by
Stuart A. Reiss
Walter M. Scott

Makeup Department
Mary Babcock	....	hair stylist
Jack Barron	....	makeup artist
John Chambers	....	creative makeup design
Daniel C. Striepeke	....	makeup supervisor (as Dan Striepeke)
Verne Langdon	....	special makeup effects artist (uncredited)
Jan Van Uchelen	....	hair stylist (uncredited)

Production Management
Francisco Day	....	unit production manager

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Joseph Lenzi	....	assistant director (as Pepi Lenzi)
Joseph E. Rickards	....	assistant director (uncredited)

Art Department
Bill Sully	....	art illustrator

Sound Department
Theodore Soderberg	....	sound
Dean Vernon	....	sound
Raul A. Bruce	....	boom operator (uncredited)

Special Effects by
Johnny Borgese	....	special effects (uncredited)

Visual Effects by
L.B. Abbott	....	special photographic effects (uncredited)

Stunts
Jerry Brutsche	....	stunt performer (uncredited)
James W. Gavin	....	aerial stunts (uncredited)
Larry Holt	....	stunts (uncredited)

Music Department
Arthur Morton	....	orchestrator
Bob Bain	....	musician: guitar (uncredited)

Transportation Department
Chris Haynes	....	driver (uncredited)

Other crew
Jack Hirshberg	....	unit publicist
Roy Kabat	....	animal furnisher

Production Companies

• Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation (presents) (as Twentieth Century-Fox)
• APJAC Productions (produced by) (as APJAC Productions, Inc.)

Distributors

• Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation (1971) (USA) (theatrical) (released by) (as Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corp.)
• 20th Century Fox (1971) (France) (theatrical)
• Fox Films (1971) (Finland) (theatrical)
• 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment Japan (2001) (Japan) (DVD)
• 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment (1999) (USA) (video) (laserdisc)
• 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment (2006) (USA) (DVD)
• Abril Vídeo (19??) (Brazil) (VHS)
• CBS/Fox (1985) (USA) (VHS)
• CBS/Fox (1991) (USA) (video) (laserdisc)
• Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) (1973) (USA) (TV) (broadcast premiere)
• FS Film Oy (2001) (2007) (Finland) (DVD) (both 6-disc editions)
• Nelonen (1997) (1999) (Finland) (TV)
• Playhouse Home Video (1985) (USA) (VHS)
• Showtime (1980s) (Finland) (VHS)
• Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment (19??) (Netherlands) (VHS)
• Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment (2005) (Netherlands) (DVD)
• Yleisradio (YLE) (1991) (Finland) (TV)

Special Effects

• Howard Anderson Company, The (special photographic effects) (as Howard A. Anderson Co.)

Also Known As:

Runtime:

98 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Westrex Recording System)

Certification:

Australia:M | Norway:12 (1972) | Sweden:11 | UK:PG (video rating: 1987) | UK:U (original rating) | USA:G | Singapore:PG | Australia:PG (TV rating) | Brazil:Livre | Finland:K-12

Filming Locations:

Downtown, Los Angeles, California, USA

Company:

Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation

Trivia:

Ricardo Montalban's character (Armando) gives a Francis of Assisi medal to Zira's newborn baby. Bradford Dillman who played Dr. Lewis Dixon in the movie, played Francis of Assisi (1961) in a movie back in 1961.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: When Cornelius, Zira and Milo are first taken to the zoo, Roddy McDowall's neck is visible underneath his makeup.

Quotes:

Dr. Zira:Because I loathe bananas!

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Mike & Molly: Cigar Talk (#1.22)" (2011)

Paradox of the Apes

Following the cataclysmic finale of Beneath the Planet of the Apes, there was only one logical direction for the series to go---> back to the future. The result is an illogically conceived and satirical prequel that will amuse and delight and ultimately devastate with its bleak Shakesperean tragedy.

When Taylor's spacecraft unexpectedly splashes down in 1973 and is retrieved by a military envoy, the three astronauts that emerge from the capsule are not revealed to be Taylor, Landon and Dodge, but rather the astonishing simian ape-chimps Cornelius, Zira and Milo... the third of which is a completely disposable character who is appropriately killed off very early by a caged zoo gorilla who was probably jealous that the talking simian chimpanzees were getting all of the attention. With Milo out of the picture, the story focuses on the relationship between Cornelius and Zira in ways that were not afforded the opportunity in the two previous films and is filled with tongue-in-cheek episodes inspired by Pierre Boulle's original novel as Cornelius and Zira go around "aping" 20th century human culture (a subtle and clever mockery of our own) in an attempt to make themselves fit in to our society.

While Cornelius and Zira make themselves at home as cultural "celebrities" they are being carefully monitored under the watchful auspices of the nefarious Dr. Otto Hasslein played by recognizable character actor Eric Braeden (of Young and the Restless fame) who listens with great interest to what the talking chimps have to say about where they came from during a Presidential Inquiry and how they managed to arrive in Taylor's spacecraft as Cornelius explains that the capsule was found when it washed ashore and was repaired by Milo -- an implausibility which is the film's glaring continuity error since Taylor's spacecraft sunk into the depths of the Forbidden Zone it is a far fetched conclusion that they somehow managed to not only find, retrieve and repair it (even if they had repaired Astronaut Brent's crashed spacecraft from Beneath which was overlooked as well) with engineering far in advance of their own intellectual ape intelligence (which Milo only "half-understood" as Cornelius describes it) but managed to do so and escape within a very small window of time before the planet was obliterated by the shock-wave of destruction catapulting them backwards in time and arriving at roughly the same destination and era as Taylor's original point of departure (it could be argued that these narrative inconsistencies support evidence of "Hasslein's Observed Time Curve" which suggest that a predestination paradox created alternate intersecting timelines as illustrated by the incongruent timeline of events between Conquest and Battle). Nevertheless, once you get past the major plot hole and just go with it, Escape is a fun and dramatically intense film but is my least favorite second only to the weakest link in the evolutionary Apes chain; Battle For The Planet of the Apes.

When Zira announces that she is pregnant, the film takes a dark and conspiratorial turn when the government realizes the consequence a race of intelligent talking apes will have on the future of our human society. In an effort to protect their newborn, Cornelius and Zira find refuge with Armando, a sideshow circus entertainer played by the extravagant Ricardo Montalban who gladly welcomes the simian family with open arms, but it isn't long before Dr. Otto Hasslein picks up the fugitives' trail and hunts them down in a tragic and inevitable climax that sets up the paradox of the entire Planet of the Apes chronology.