Saga Of The Apes

Finally got around to watching this edit and it is just a super cool way to watch the whole darn Planet of the Apes saga in one sitting. (except Battle for the POTA, which is a fairly irrelevant and pointless sequel anyways) BionicBob is rapidly becoming one of my favorite editors. He has a real instinct for storytelling and maintaining the flow. The use of multiple scenes on the screen was remarkably effective in telling the dual stories simultaneously.

I still haven't been able to answer the question I raised in the forum, which was whether the story as it is cut could be made sense of by a novice to the POTA. I tried to get my 15 year old son to sit and watch it, but to no avail. He has only seen this 21st century versions and I wanted to see if he could follow it. If I get this done, I will report back.

This is a short review because I really don't have any nitpicks with the edit. Any nitpicks would be with the source material, outside the control of the editor.

Great job Bob and congratulations. Your creativity and technical acumen are outstanding.

Another keeper!

A bold, bold fanediting idea pulled off with tremendous skill - both narratively and technically.

I thought the multi-screen idea was going to be a bit of a headache to be honest, but once I started watching I understood it almost straight away. And the technique, while used often, wasn't overused.

I've seen 3 of 4 original films - many, many years ago - but I'm no Apes purist. This was very entertaining a very different fanedit experience.

Technically, the editing is clean, the video/audio quality good considering the sources, and the audio is generally well mixed. I did notice interlacing in some footage but it wasn't too distracting.

I watched the DVD version. One suggestion: the editor might offer viewers an MP4/MKV option - a slow 2-pass x264 encode at around 2000kbps to give his fanedit the best possible video quality. Work like this deserves it.

Congrats Bob.

Incredible. Watching one film in a parallel fashion with another film was amazing. The stories worked so well together. It's obvious this was a labor of love by a POTA fan, and from one fan to another, you nailed it. Excellent work.

Pure and simple, if this edit doesn't become at least a strong contender for the next FEOTY contest, I'll eat my Sideshow Dr. Zaius 12 inch figure. It's just that amazing.

Volume 1 is about perfection. Apes I and III complement each other so much that it's almost too easy to mix them. Volume 2 was trickier, Apes II and IV being so different to each other, but the results are impressive. Bob found a lot of parallels between them. A scene from Beneath about leaving things just the way they are is combined with the apes revolt starting in Conquest. Taylor and Brent fight in the dungeon, while we see apes riots in 1991. Brent and Caesar are tortured simultaneously. Brilliant. And the multiple screen style fits these movies like a glove. They could have played in theaters like this back in the 70s, as did films like The Boston Strangler and Wicked, Wicked.

Video and audio quality is very good. If anything, the interlacing is apparent in some of the reduced screens (never when the shots fill the whole screen, though), and in a couple of moments the added music eats up the dialog a bit. Very minor things, though. The two deleted scenes provided were fun to watch, but Bob did the right thing not including them.

Thanks, Bob, for yet another wonderful edit, your best so far. Two paws way up!

In his "About This Edit" segment, BionicBob wonders if he has made an edit that can please both Ape fanboys and Ape novices. Well, from what I've read of the other reviews, Ape fanboys are overjoyed with this. I hadn't seen any of the Apes movies (originals) besides the first one. Never saw a second of any of the sequels. (But I own the boxset, I'll take a picture for you if you want.)

So, can the non-Ape-initiated follow the plot? Can they get excited for these movies because of this edit? Does it make one want to watch all the Planet of the Apes films?

YES. YES. YES.