Showing posts with label planet of the apes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label planet of the apes. Show all posts

18 Nov 2023

No Matter What the Future Brings ...

"You must remember this / A kiss is just a kiss ..." [1]
 
 
I. 
 
The kiss between Kirk (played by William Shatner) and Uhura (played by Nichelle Nichols) in an episode of Star Trek entitled 'Plato's Stepchildren' [2] - which was first broadcast 55 years ago this month - is often cited - incorrectly - as the first example of an interracial kiss on television [3].
 
Even if not actually true - and even if their lips do not actually touch [4] - it was a nice moment and (in a time of heightened racial tension) a significant one. Indeed, it is often ranked as one of the greatest romantic moments in Star Trek and one of the most culturally impactful. 
 
For me, however, as the author of a series of papers on zoophilia [5], there is another on-screen kiss in 1968 which interests more; and that is the kiss shared between Taylor (played by Charlton Heston) and Zira (played by Kim Hunter) in the movie Planet of the Apes (dir. Franklin J. Shaffner) ...
 
 
II.
 
The original - and the best - Planet of the Apes movie (written by Michael Wilson and Rod Serling, loosely based on the 1963 novel by Pierre Boulle), is fondly remembered by many people for many scenes and many lines of dialogue. 
 
That includes, obviously, the still-shocking end scene when Taylor realises where he is and what has happened: 'Oh, my God. I'm back. I'm home. All the time ... We finally, really did it. You maniacs! You blew it up! God damn you! God damn you all to hell!' [Click here.]

But my favourite scene comes shortly before this, when Taylor is about to ride off, accompanied by Nova, in search of what Dr Zaius terms his destiny
 
Wishing to express his gratitude to Cornelius and Zira for the help they have given him, he informs the latter he'd like to give her a kiss. She gives her consent and seems to enjoy the touch of his lips on hers, even if she finds Taylor so damned ugly. [Click here.]

Again, it's  a very touching scene and, arguably, far more transgressive than the kiss in Star Trek, hinting as it does at the possibility of interspecies romantic relations - particularly human-chimp sexuality, something that I have previously discussed on Torpedo the Ark: click here.   
 
 
III.
 
Amusingly, in her 1994 autobiography Beyond Uhura Nichelle Nichols recalls that one person describing himself as a proud white Southerner wrote the following in a letter to the studio after her kiss with Shatner was broadcast: 
 
"'I am totally opposed to the mixing of the races. However, any time a red-blooded American boy like Captain Kirk gets a beautiful dame in his arms that looks like Uhura, he ain't gonna fight it.'" [6]
 
One can't help wondering if a similar letter was received by the producers of Planet of the Apes, that might possibly have read:
 
I am totally opposed to the mixing of species. However, any time an all-American hero like George Taylor gets rescued by a beautiful chimp scientist like Zira, he may as well take advantage of the fact. 
 
 
Notes
 
[1] These lines (and the line used in the title of this post) are from the jazz song "As Time Goes By" written by Herman Hupfeld in 1931. It became famous when it featured in the 1942 film Casablanca, performed by Dooley Wilson as the piano player Sam. Click here.
 
[2] Star Trek, 'Plato's Stepchildren' [S3/E10], directed by David Alexander, written by Gene Roddenberry, Meyer Dolinsky, and Arthur H. Singer, was first broadcast on 22 November 1968. The scene in which Kirk kisses Uhura can be viewed on YouTube by clicking here
 
[3] Although widely believed to be the first interracial kiss on TV, there are, in fact, several earlier incidents of such. For example, Shatner himself exchanged a kiss with France Nuyen - a French-American actress of Asian heritage - on an episode of The Ed Sullivan Show back in 1958 (they were performing a scene from the Broadway production of The World of Suzie Wong in which they starred).
      Shatner, in his role as Captain Kirk, also kissed Lt. Marlena Moreau, played by BarBara Luna, an actress of Filipino-European ancestry, on the lips in the second season episode of Star Trek entitled 'Mirrror, Mirror' (1967).
 
[4] Shatner would later reveal that concerned NBC executives had insisted their lips never touch, using the technique of turning their heads away from the camera to conceal what was (or was not) going on. However, writing in her 1994 autobiography, Beyond Uhura, Nichols insists that in the take of the scene that was eventually broadcast the kiss was genuine. Despite the concerns expressed, the episode received no complaints - in fact the response from fans of the show was hugely positive. 
 
[5] See The Treadwell's Papers, Vol. III, (Blind Cupid Press, 2010). The six papers in the Zoophilia series (also known as the Bodil Joensen Memorial Lectures) were first presented at Treadwell's Bookshop in Feb-March 2007. 
 
[6] Nichelle Nichols, Beyond Uhura: Star Trek and Other Memories, (G. P. Putnam and Sons, 1994), pp. 196-197. 


1 Sept 2015

Planet of the Apes and the Negro of Banyoles

 El negre de Banyoles (1916-1997)


One of the more shocking moments in Planet of the Apes (1968) is when Taylor - attempting to escape from his simian captors - finds himself in the Natural Science Museum and encounters the stuffed corpse of his fellow astronaut, Dodge, mounted on public display. 

But the question is: why was Dodge sent to the taxidermist and displayed in this manner? Why Dodge and not Landon? 

The answer is given in the novelization of the sequel, Escape from the Planet of the Apes (1971), where it's revealed that the apes - having never seen a black man before - were intrigued by Dodge's skin colour. This adds an interesting further level of complexity and controversy to a franchise that is already often viewed in terms of racial politics. 

I recalled this scene after recently reading about the Negro of Banyoles, a stuffed human figure which, for many years, was exhibited at the Darder Museum, Spain. 

The striking and rather fearsome-looking piece was produced by the Verreaux brothers; famous 19th century French naturalists, collectors, and dealers of exotic specimens. It was acquired by the small museum in Catalonia in 1916 and soon widely became known as el negre de Banyoles - much loved by locals and tourists alike.

However, in October 1991, the mayor of Banyoles received a letter from Alphonse Arcelin demanding that the figure be permanently removed from display. Arcelin, a doctor, originally from Haiti, thought the figure an unacceptable relic from a colonial era steeped in racism and argued that its continued display was an affront to humanity (and particularly to persons of colour, such as himself).

Unfortunately for Snr. Arcelin, the mayor, the council, the museum staff, and the townspeople all disagreed with him and so he was forced to take things further. The subsequent hoo-ha attracted extensive media coverage and political reaction. Eventually, the UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan, became personally involved with the case and also wrote to the mayor of Banyoles to express his outrage and disappointment with the town's refusal to remove the figure. 

Other African heads of state also contributed to the debate and pressed for the Negro to be allowed to return to his homeland where he might finally be allowed to rest in peace. The fact that no one really knew where this homeland was and that he was actually an it didn't seem to deter them. 

Finally, in 1997, after six years of international pressure and wrangling, the figure was stripped of its loincloth and feathered headdress and sent to the National Museum of Anthropology in Madrid, where all artificial components were removed, including the wooden spine, glass eyes, artificial hair, and fake genitals. What remained - basically just dried skin and bone - was then placed in a coffin and shipped over to Botswana, for ceremonial burial in a national park.

Whether this constitutes a moral victory and a dignified end to the story of the Negro of Banyoles, is debatable. Obviously, like Dodge, the figure was displayed as an oddity and no one cared about the fact that it had once been a living man with a name. But then we don't care either about Egyptian mummies, or the bodies of saints preserved and displayed as religious relics ...
   
Ultimately, the question is whether corpses retain their human status and identities and should, therefore, share the same rights as the living. Personally, I don't quite see it. For whilst the living might be construed as very rare and unusual objects, it's a stretch to think of the dead as genuine subjects (particularly bodies that have been artificially preserved and turned into rather creepy exhibits).           


16 Jul 2014

From Chimpan-A to Chimpan-Z

Still from The Simpsons episode 19, season 7
© 20th Century Fox Film Corp.


It's amazing to observe how, after forty-odd years, the Planet of the Apes franchise continues to capture the imagination of a global movie-going audience. People, it seems, just can't get enough of those crazy sci-fi simians and militant monkeys. 

The latest cinematic installment, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, dir. Matt Reeves and starring Andy Serkis as Caesar, opened in the US a few days ago, immediately topping the box office and taking $73 million in it's first weekend. The film also received extremely positive reviews; not just for the stunning special effects, but also as a piece of well-crafted, intelligent story-telling. British audiences will be able to decide for themselves how successful or otherwise this sequel to the series reboot, Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011), is when it finally opens here tomorrow (July 17th). 

Sadly, however, I won't be going.

And the reason I won't be going is because, for me, as for many others, it's simply become impossible to view any of the great ape films without remembering the classic Simpsons episode which featured Troy McClure appearing in a musical adaptation of the original 1968 movie, mockingly entitled Stop the Planet of the Apes - I Want to Get Off!

Flashbacks of apes break-dancing to a brilliantly rewritten version of Falco's 1985 classic track, 'Let Me Rock You Amadeus', still result in tears of joy - and tears of joy streaming down one's face don't allow you to watch a clichéd, over-earnest and super-serious action thriller, which ultimately attempts to make monkeys of its audience as well as its lead actors. 
   

Notes: 

The Simpsons episode to which I refer - 'A Fish Called Selma' - was directed by Mark Kirkland, written by Jack Barth (before being revised by the usual in-house team), and guest starred Phil Hartman as Troy McClure. It originally aired on 24 March, 1996. 

The song 'Dr. Zaius' - one of the funniest musical numbers ever included in the show - was primarily written by George Meyer. The now classic line "from chimpan-A to chimpan-Z" in the final song of the musical was written by David Cohen 

Thanks to Joe22c for uploading this clip on Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/47069867