Planet Of The Apes

By EWAN McDONALD

You could grind your teeth, scratch whatever it is that chimpanzees scratch, and ask why Tim Burton even bothered to try to remake one of the movies that appears on everyone's top 10, if they're really honest about it and not trying to impress people by naming really obscure Scandinavian comedies.

Or you could just enjoy this for what it is: innovative and inventive and entertaining if not quite breathtaking.

Mark Wahlberg stars as astronaut Leo Davidson, who lives on a space station near Saturn, where he trains genetically enhanced apes to fly where it's too dangerous for humans to go. An electromagnetic storm blows through, his chimp is sent out to explore and gets lost, so Leo goes where no man has gone before.

He crashes on a strange planet and is pursued by giant talking apes. He finds that humans are slaves here and escapes on a mission to find out what's going on.

Helena Bonham-Carter co-stars as Ari, chimp for human rights, who saves Leo and develops a thing for him; Tim Roth is General Thade, the meanest monkey on the planet, who wants to wipe out the humans and have tea-parties with Ari.

There's also a cameo for the star of the original, Charlton Heston, which has a less than quiet irony when you consider his later career as chief apologist — sorry, frontman — for America's gun-toting National Rifle Association.

Makeup, effects and actors have come a long way in 33 years. Burton's apes are amazing — people look and move like chimps, orang-utans, and gorillas; their city and army bases are marvellous pieces of design.

Downers: the best that can be said of Wahlberg's performance is that it rivals Heston's in the original and the word that best describes both is "wooden"; the movie is too long; and Burton's ending is dumb. It doesn't match the breathtaking surprise of the original.

Rental video, DVD: Today

• DVD features: movie (119 mins); commentaries by Tim Burton and Danny Elfman; enhanced viewing mode, takes you behind the scenes as you watch the film; six documentaries: Ape School, Makeup, Costume Tests, Shooting On Location, Scoring The Film and Ape Stunts; five extended scenes; HBO special; multi-angle scene studies, see action from the director's chair; music video (Rule The Planet Remix, Paul Oakenfold); concept art gallery; trailers, TV spots.