MovieChat Forums > Battle for the Planet of the Apes (1973) Discussion > How did the other apes manage to talk?

How did the other apes manage to talk?

posted 4 years ago by [deleted]
9 replies | jump to latest

By the end of Conquest, only Caesar could speak, which makes perfect sense. Then this movie comes along, and EVERY ape can speak perfectly, giving the impression that many, many years have passed. However, the story specifically doesn't mention generations or anything, and does give the impression that only a few years have passed, if that. Weirdly enough, even the characterisation of Caesar has changed, where he seems to be more naive.

So confusing. Average movie as well, although I did like the Aldo/Cornelius/Caesar dynamic.

[–] [deleted] 4 years ago

Never explained. This series was really the first franchise movie series, but it all came about more by accident than planning. (The early James Bond movies aren't a franchise in the sense we use the term today.) The first movie was supposed to be a standalone. Then Heston thought he could finish the series with the second one by blowing up Earth.

The final three movies were more about milking the cash cow, then making movies that told a consistent story.

If I were to 'play scriptwriter' I would explain it away as the apes had been genetically engineered for intelligence to suit their new roles as slaves. They were also modified physically so that they could speak. (Functionally, apes can't speak...). So they had the ability for language but their human overlords hadn't yet incorporated that into their training. Caesar taught the initial batch who then fanned out to teach others.

btw, I live in Victoria, Canada. The director of this movie, J. Lee Thompson, lived here for the final decades of his life. Hie directed the last two movies. Conquest is generally well received, but the last one is regarded as a joke. In an interview for our local paper, he was bitter about how the studio gave him the very cheapest of budgets for this movie, forcing him to scrap some scenes which he considered important.

[–] [deleted] 4 years ago

"The final three movies were more about milking the cash cow, then making movies that told a consistent story."

I don't agree, and my particular favourite is Escape, because it basically brings the future apes back to roughly our present, in an eerie facsimile of the Terminator franchise, in that the talking apes Cornelius and Zira will beget a child who starts the ball rolling towards the ape future.

In fact, the whole five movies feels like a full circle to me, and whilst Battle is the weakest, it still satisfies in general.

[–] millsey72 (9557) 2 years ago

The obvious answer is Cesar taught the other apes how to talk. However if it were me, I would have had all animals on Earth to have the power of speech and you get a full scale war for world domination between all species on Earth

[–] millsey72 (9557) 3 years ago

Yup, you found a plot hole

[–] TimMC (9143) 3 years ago

Super Easy. Barely an Inconvenience.

Hollywood Magic.

[–] millsey72 (9557) 2 years ago

Cesar taught the apes how to speak

[–] emori (3092) 2 months ago

Weak writing. The only reason. They wanted to continue Caesar story and have him. While they should have jumped 600 years.

[–] millsey72 (9557) 2 months ago

How is it weak writing? We saw in the beginning there was a teacher teaching other apes in school. English was one of the subjects

[–] emori (3092) 2 months ago

Cornelius literally said it took centuries to have apes smarten up and to start talking and shifting humans aside. Yet with last 2 movies of that franchise everything happened during like 20-30 years.

It's weak writing. They put themselves into corner when they ended 3-d movie with Cornelius and Zira baby being born and saved. And then felt they had to continue that storyline. So they jumped 20 years and suddenly apes are so smart they can do haircuts and cleaning. If you think they can do that - go and try to train monkey to do haircuts. Good luck.

Then they had their ridiculous revolt and for some reason still wanted to continues with Caesar story. So they jumped another 15 years and suddenly all apes talk and behave like humans. Go and try to train ape to talk. Good luck with that.

They should have jumped 500-600 years for that. That whole human extinction and apes taking over would not happened in 35 years. Cornelius himself told it was happening during centuries.

That's why in new trilogy they created virus that made apes smarter and wiped out humanity. And then those who were immune - stopped speaking and dumbed down when virus mutated. That was more realistic.

Still after like 20-30 years apes could barely talk and were not that super smart.