Before we ever get to the Statue of Liberty, we get plenty of other hints that I would rather say are even bigger tell signs – and I doubt those were spoiled. I saw it again (all 5) recently over just one week, and was surprised that anyone would ever think it was not Earth...
• he starts the movie by explaining how there is a theory on how time on earth would have speed up tremendously compared to the time in their space ship. And we are directly shown that by then 700 years on Earth had already passed... this is even before the crash.
• The mission was meant to arrive far into the future on Earth. In fact, several of thousands of years was planned - so it went according to plan.
• When they crash he see that Earth time is several of thousands of years ahead of them, and he makes a point of this (which is irrelevant with all due respect, unless of course it was Earth they were on)
• His mates are not too convinced they are on another Planet. In other words, they think this is Earth.
• The Apes speak perfect english and even writs perfect english. Yes. this is classic Hollywood but they make a point out of the fact that he writes perfect "English"... I mean, this is one amazing coincidence, no? Normally when the Nazis speak english with a broken accent we suspend our disbelieve and hear it as their original language... well, in this the Apes speaks and writes english. No two ways around it. The story have them speak English. And they do so perfectly.
• He visits an archaeological dig, where they find remains of advanced humans, with medical dentures, pacemaler etc... AND they also find a doll, which we can buy in any plain toy shop here on earth, together with curly hair and a white dress...(he should have looked for "Made in Taiwan") even including the "flip it" and it talks.... well, had it been me, this might have been it... to Taylor, he hardly cared.
The true twist is that it took the Statue of Liberty to convince him.
A side note; of all the signs that this is in fact Earth (the atmosphere, landscape, that the space computer was programmed to land on earth, the time future was according to plan, perfect english communication in both writing and speaking, humans and apes and horses, remains of a past human culture with medical known denture and pacemakers etc and a damn plastic doll) then the weathered down Statue of Liberty (big head with spikes and a torch) is the ONE HINT of all of those that would be the most likely to have been coincidentally recreated on another planet and in another culture, no?
It was a great twist back in the day. Not in this time and not to this audience. I dare say.
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thingmakersback (1188)
12 days ago
Back in the day, the "twist" only worked to the extent that audiences were used to things like Star Trek and a good many movies to accept the ludicrous notion of humans evolving independently on other planets... Speaking English on other planets. So the "apes", corn, horses etc were not surprising.
Oh, and I do not think his mates believed they were on Earth. I remember a conversation in the raft about the sun being "...too white for Bellatrix. We don't know where we are." Of course Taylor had just rattled off some nonsense about their being 300 light years from Earth on an unnamed planet in orbit around a star in the constellation of Orion, and nobody raised an eyebrow.
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