BENEATH THE PLANET OF THE APES 1970
38%
Directed by Ted Post
Written by Paul Dehn and Mort Abrahams
Starring James Franciscus, Kim Hunter, Linda Harrison, David Watson, Maurice Evans
Synopsis
Immediately following the events of Planet of the Apes, a second spacecraft crashes in the Forbidden Zone, marooning another astronaut whose crew was tasked with investigating the fate of the first expedition. Brent, the only survivor, encounters a newly militarized ape population determined to infiltrate the Forbidden Zone and comes face to face with humanity’s past.
Why We Love It
The original Planet of the Apes franchise didn’t really begin to build its ongoing mythology until the third film in the series, 1971’s Escape from the Planet of the Apes, which brought chimpanzee scientists Zira and Cornelius to present-day Earth and set the stage for future installments, including the recently rebooted trilogy. The second film in the series, Beneath, however, initially feels like a retread of the first movie (a tact that never impresses the critics) before it gets downright weird (which frequently baffles the critics), so plenty of folks are content to dismiss the entry as an unnecessary placeholder, even if its final scenes mark the chronological end of the saga. The biggest shortcoming of the film is that it was unable to secure Charlton Heston to reprise his role as Taylor for a second adventure across future-Earth (anyone who remembers the gas station scene in Wayne’s World 2 is aware how much of a difference his presence—and absence—can make). So the filmmakers chose instead to hire James Franciscus, and to his credit, he does a pretty decent job making you forget he’s not essentially just “Discount Heston.” Hell, when fully bearded, he looks just like him.
As Brent, Franciscus quickly speeds through the same story beats that Heston’s Taylor encountered in the first film—the discovery of intelligent apes, the meet-cute with Linda Harrison’s Nova, the request for assistance from Zira and Cornelius—but that’s where Beneath takes a hard left into nightmare territory and gets really interesting. Brent and Nova eventually discover the ancient remains of the New York City subway system, all train tracks and decrepit turnstiles overtaken by centuries of calcification, and the sets are appropriately eerie and evocative. Then come the mutants. That’s right: mutants. Specifically, they’re human descendants who literally wear skin suits, possess extrasensory powers, and worship a nuclear bomb. It’s an absolutely bonkers concept, but it’s fascinating; it also makes perfect sense in the greater lore of the Apes series, and it leads to a terrifying, chaotic finish.
Unlike the sequels that followed it, Beneath the Planet of the Apes was less interested in exploring Important Ideas than it was in expanding upon the story of the first film and ratcheting up the existential dread. It can’t hope to compare with its predecessor, but it doesn’t have to, because it’s got veiny albino telepaths who inspire apocalyptic terror with hymns about weapons of mass destruction. There’s more to the film than just that, of course, but sometimes, that’s all you need.