I have to say, this is one of my mother's favorite movies, and I can see why. Taylor is a die-hard cynic, especially when it comes to humanity and the human condition of the 20th Century. He sees everything that's wrong with us, and weighed against anything that's right, it weighs heavy. People kill, they fight, they destroy their own habitat; they lie, they cheat and they live to selfish ends. There is no hope for humanity in his view. Then to be dumped in a world where humans have become animals, and the animals human, forces Taylor to re-evaluate everything he's believed. He finds himself allied on a side that upholds what scraps of good he can find about humanity. It culminates in the ironically popular line, "Get your filthy hands off me you damned, dirty apes."
I don't mean to suggest that my mother was a cynic or felt the same way about humanity, but she had a healthy respect for the attitude of the author of that story and that particular character, because it observes humanity from an objective perspective. And ultimately, it is wrong about humanity. Whether human or ape, there is always more than meets the eye.
I was impressed with the new movies, with their realistic CGI apes, up until the point where Ceasar let Koba die with the observation, "You are not ape." I suppose the implication was that Koba, the abused ape who suffered at the hands of humanity, had learned too well from his captors--but my only thought was that now Caesar had learned to be human. To kill one's own kind was a hallmark of the distinction between ape and human. But that's what it takes to kill: to alienate the other.
I don't mean to suggest that my mother was a cynic or felt the same way about humanity, but she had a healthy respect for the attitude of the author of that story and that particular character, because it observes humanity from an objective perspective. And ultimately, it is wrong about humanity. Whether human or ape, there is always more than meets the eye.
I was impressed with the new movies, with their realistic CGI apes, up until the point where Ceasar let Koba die with the observation, "You are not ape." I suppose the implication was that Koba, the abused ape who suffered at the hands of humanity, had learned too well from his captors--but my only thought was that now Caesar had learned to be human. To kill one's own kind was a hallmark of the distinction between ape and human. But that's what it takes to kill: to alienate the other.
