Leo seems to be only looking out for Pericles when he goes out on his own and fighting against his superior to go "get back his monkey". After landing on the Planet of the Apes however he seems to only be looking out for himself and takes the fight of civil rights and equality for humans as his fight because he knows it is his way back to his ship which is signaling him. His way of getting home is the fight of civil liberties vs slavery. Leo even gets caught when first crash landing and sees firsthand how humans are made into slaves for the apes and are kept to be unequal and lesser. In the scene when he holds Ari against his cage and threatens to hurt her, but then whispers that he needs help to get out, we see how he is developing beyond a man desperate, he is using someone who he knows can help him and sees how she wants to free humans as equals. In being helped by Ari, Leo seems to almost change his wants. Instead of only wanting to find his way home he tries to free his fellow humans and fight against the apes in rebellion of how they treat humans as filthy creatures.
Ari on the other hand develops more in our eyes as she goes from extreme civil rights activist to an ape who becomes affectionate towards a human and wants their equality for her future to blossom. Not only does it affect her, but it affects those around her. in her invacuation with Leo her man keeper, whos' name i forget, follows her and keeps with her and the humans even though he isn't fully in support of equalization for apes and humans. Ari completely goes from activist to one who simply wants equality to one who abandons her ties to her ape connections and devotes herself entirely to the equality cause and we see this when she looks at Thade through the glass, in her scar shown to him it shows how she will chose her passion over her ape comrade. In her refusal to even save him she turns her back on a chance to go back but to fully embrace equality.
Isabela, I agree that a big duality within the movie is civil liberties vs slavery. In my opinion I don't think Leo is ever really going out there "to get his monkey." He had said before that you should never send a monkey to do a man's job. That right there shows me that Leo's best interest will always be to look out for himself. At the end of the movie when the planet of the apes are all going to live together in peace, Leo decided to leave to try and go "home." This is ironic because he left the place where he could have been perfectly happy and live where everyone in equal, to go back to earth and become a captured human among the new world of apes. I like your blog and the way you opened out eyes to the way Ari changes throughout the movie and the way the people around her change.
ReplyDelete-Caitlin Wadsworth