The text is transferred from: The era background of "Planet of the Apes I" and the interpretation of human subconsciousness----Liu Fengying, Cao Hongwei----Longnan Teachers College Invasion and deletion
The movie "Planet of the Apes" comes from a series of films by the American Fox Film Company in the 20th century. The film involves many elements such as politics, religion, evolution theory, space technology, nuclear doomsday, etc. Through the absurd assumption of the reverse development of the human evolutionary chain, it constructs a future in which human beings are heading for self-destruction due to the expansion of force.
A spacecraft from the twentieth century completed its mission and began to return. The crew then went into a dormant state. Captain Taylor set the spacecraft to an automatic flight state. The spacecraft has been flying in the vast universe for nearly 700 years. time. Finally, the spacecraft landed in 3978 AD. Two surviving male crew members and Captain Taylor escape from the spacecraft, only to find themselves on an unfamiliar planet. Through instrument testing, they found that the planet is very similar to the earth's environment, and there lived some savage-like humans who used primitive means to eat wild fruits in ancient times, uncivilized and without language ability. The instruments and clothing of the three of Taylor were destroyed by these humans. When they were chasing this strange group of humans, a group of heavily armed orangutans armed with muskets suddenly appeared on horseback and captured everyone one by one. The disobedients were also killed on the spot. After being arrested, Taylor learned that the apes are the masters of the planet, they are at the top of the planet's biological chain, and humans are the research experiments they hunt and kill, and they regard humans as beasts. In the process of being held and domesticated, Taylor, whose vocal cords were damaged and temporarily lost her ability to speak, tried to communicate with Dr. Kira and her boyfriend Connelly. After a series of efforts, his behavior quickly caught Kira's attention. , Two ape doctors who are dedicated to the study of human behavior and the history of orangutans, after failing to protest against the group's violent behavior, they together with Taylor kidnapped the ape minister and fled into the restricted area of the planet. In the process of escape, Taylor, who regained his freedom, accidentally discovered the ruins in the restricted area, the half-destroyed Statue of Liberty standing on the seaside, and finally understood the truth of "Planet of the Apes" - it turned out that this is the earth that was self-destructed by human wars. .
1. The world situation during the birth of "Planet of the Apes I"
In order to eliminate the threat from unknown time and space and try to defend itself with absolute force, human beings have always been committed to the research and development of deterrent weapons, and spared no effort to manufacture them, and nuclear weapons came into being in a very short time. reached the level of saturation or even overproduction. During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union competed with each other in terms of military power. Since 1964, Briznev and others have made significant adjustments to the Soviet Union's military policy, comprehensively strengthening the construction of military forces, and expanding the strategic nuclear arsenal, in an attempt to win the war against the United States. nuclear equilibrium. Since then, the Soviet Union has entered a period of mass production and deployment of nuclear weapons. The rapid growth of defense spending from 1964 to 1972 fully reflects the Soviet Union's mentality to pay a huge price in order to achieve a position of parity with the United States. In 1963 (1963~1967), the US defense expenditure was still about 10% higher than that of the Soviet Union, but by 1968, the Soviet Union's defense expenditure reached as high as 60 billion US dollars, surpassing the US (53 billion) for the first time in history. Moreover, in order to appease the public's fear and deter the hostile countries, the military forces during this period were in a state of transparency. It is because of these factors that nuclear weapons, the "Sword of Damocles", hangs high above the heads of human beings, and thus fall into a vicious circle in which countries vigorously develop nuclear weapons, and the world situation is in jeopardy.
2. The American social background when "Planet of the Apes" was born
1. The Vietnam War
The Vietnam War started in the 1950s and lasted for nearly 20 years. It was the longest and most expensive war in American history. From the beginning of the war when the United States took over Vietnam affairs, anti-war voices began to appear at all levels. By the mid-to-late 1960s, when the United States had been mired in the Vietnam War and could not extricate itself, the nationwide anti-war movement reached its peak. Various anti-war movements emerged one after another. Among them, the movement of young students is the most radical. With the slogan of resisting conscription and rejecting war, the young students set off a climax of the anti-war movement through parades, lectures, sit-ins, etc. Kennedy was assassinated in November 1963. Vice President Johnson takes office. The most important decision he made diplomatically was to expand the Vietnam War. By 1967, the United States had been completely caught in the quagmire of the Vietnam War and could not extricate itself, and domestic anti-war voices were constantly rising. In January 1968, the Vietnamese people launched the Spring Festival Offensive, which hit the U.S. military heavily and caused an uproar in the U.S. government and opposition. Domestic public opinion generally believes that the prospects for the entire Vietnam war are bleak.
2. The Black Movement
The black movement is also known as the African-A-merican Civil Rights Movement. Beginning in the 16th century, due to the rise of the slave trade, European colonists plundered black slaves from Africa, and some of them were sent to the United States. At first, the plantations and mines in the southern states were their destination, but with the development of the industrial revolution, they were successively moved to cities in the north. For three centuries, these black slaves and their descendants were subjected to countless cruel and inhumane oppression, exploitation and abuse. Black Americans have no advantages in politics, economy, housing, employment, education, etc. They are at the bottom of society and are constantly threatened by hunger, disease and death. They have fought unremittingly for this. In the 1940s and 1950s, racial discrimination in the United States reached an unprecedented extreme, and the resulting conflicts became more and more intense. Black Americans account for half of the citizens of the United States, but they have been treated unequally by racial discrimination for a long time, which greatly reduced the cohesion of the United States. After the end of the Civil War, although the United States legislated to abolish slavery, it was still a dead letter and did not fundamentally solve this problem. . In 1957, the most influential organization in the civil rights movement, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, was formed, with Martin Luther King as its chairman. In 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. delivered a speech "I Have a Dream" in front of 250,000 supporters at the Lincoln Memorial Plaza in Washington, bringing the civil rights movement to its peak. In 1967, Dr. King deeply realized that the root cause of black discrimination in American society was economic inequality. But just as Abraham Lincoln was shot by John Weeks at the Ford Theater in Washington on the evening of April 14, 1865, after the Civil War was launched, on April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King, the leader of the American civil rights movement, was shot to death. Shot to death by white racist James Earl Ray in Tennessee. Subsequently, black protests broke out in 150 cities in the United States. This is undoubtedly a great irony for the US authorities who have always advertised themselves as free and equal. On April 16, Mao Zedong issued a statement in support of the anti-violence struggle of black Americans. Mao Zedong said: "I appeal to workers, peasants, revolutionary intellectuals and all those who are willing to oppose U.S. imperialism all over the world to act and give strong solidarity to the struggle of black Americans! Our common enemy U.S. imperialism and its accomplices launch a persistent and violent attack! It is certain that the complete collapse of colonialism, imperialism and all systems of exploitation and the complete overturning of all the oppressed peoples and nations in the world are not far off. "
3. The human subconscious in "Planet of the Apes".
1. The tendency of human beings to self-destruct
Pierre Boole's inspiration for "Planet of the Apes" came from the world situation of that era. At that time, it was in the era of the bipolar "Cold War". Both the Soviet Union and the United States had nuclear forces that could easily destroy the world. At that time, large-scale ethnic conflicts and feminist movements were breaking out in the United States. These events were combined, and the "Planet of the Apes" was born. 1968" is an absurd yet visionary story. Whether it is the mapping of the Cold War or the exaggeration of racial conflicts, they are all bold speculations based on the existing facts, combined with the dark factors of deep human consciousness, revealing to us a very likely cruel future of human self-destruction Tendency.
2. Human insecurity
The essence of the rise of the apes in the movie stems from the instinct of human insecurity. Facing the unknown starry sky, whether it is the possibility of aliens or the destructive development of the earth's environment, all make mankind full of despair and anxiety about the future.
3. Humans’ subconsciousness to escape when faced with disasters
The appearance of the spaceship implies the subconscious mind of fleeing when disaster strikes. It means that human beings have long been able to predict the disasters that may occur in the future, but they cannot help themselves and can only develop according to the inertia of history. After losing self-control, since self-destruction cannot be stopped, the only thing that can be done is to escape. The acceleration of time in the film is based on Einstein's time tunnel theory. This theme is most prominent in "The Terminator", which implies that human beings expect to return to the past from the future when the end comes, and eliminate disasters in the beginning. At the same time, it reveals the negative attitude of human beings who do not want to repent but deceive themselves.
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