Wednesday, October 3, 2018

The Making Of Planet Of The Apes


As much as I enjoyed the new Planet Of The Apes movies they can’t compare with the original film.

Starring Charlton Heston, in 1968, the original Planet Of The Apes movie was, and is, a shocker.

In 1968 I was 15 years old the buzz going around was that Planet Of The Apes film was a real shocker and was not to be missed. 

My friends and I attended the first showing of the film in my hometown and as promised, the film was shocking, unsettling and unnerving.  It was an instant hit.

I still remember how queasy I felt when I saw the roundup, lobotomy, taxidermy and Statue of Liberty scenes.  Appalled, and yet fascinated, I was swept away by the physical and visual effects.

Scenes of the downed spaceship, the barren foreboding landscape, the haunting scarecrows, the Apes’ village, the wholesale slaughter of humans and the talking Apes set my nerves on edge.

Planet Of The Apes deserves to be the cult classic film that it is.

Harper Design and Jonathon Rinzler have collaborated to bring readers The Making Of Planet Of The Apes book.

Resplendent with black and white photos, art, character and set sketches, production paintings, set schematics, production notes, promotional material and various other movie production literature, the book delves deeply into the making of the classic film.

Full production documentation, commentaries by cast and crew and a historical recounting of the making of the film make for a fascinating, enlightening and eye-opening read.

The oversize hardbound book is jam-packed with so much information and visual references that it takes literally hours to pour over everything.

I especially love looking at the costume designs, set pieces, location shots and other behind-the-scenes photos and reading up about the how, why, where, when and who associated with the film.  

It is an amazing compilation of film making and history that Ape fans, as well as film fans, are sure to enjoy.

Discover how a classic science fiction film, sans computer digital effects, was made and changed the face of film-making forever.