Metacritic reviews

Escape from Planet of the Apes is, in fact, a superior film in many ways to the first, but is lacking that film’s freshness and originality. Still: an undeniable high watermark for the franchise.

Escape From The Planet Of The Apes gets the series back on track, sending three apes back to the 20th century for a story that begins comically and ends in fear and loathing.

Escape from the Planet of the Apes is an excellent film, almost as good as the original Planet of the Apes. Arthur Jacobs’ production is marked by an outstanding script, using some of the original Pierre Boulle novel characters; excellent direction by Don Taylor; and superior performances from a cast headed by encoring Roddy McDowall and Kim Hunter.

Nobody is going to believe it, but I must say anyway that Don Taylor's Escape From the Planet of the Apes is one of the better new movies in town, and better in a genre—science-fiction—that at the crucial middle level where the history of movies is made, if not written, has recently been not so much bad as invisible.

McDowell is as good as ever here – this time playing Cornelius – while Kim Hunter is hugely sympathetic as Zira.

Former actor Don Taylor directs smoothly and efficiently and elicits fine performances from the cast, highlighted by the warm relationship between Zira, (a touching Kim Hunter) and Cornelius, knowingly played by Roddy McDowall, who returns in the role after being replaced in the first sequel because he was directing a movie (TAM-LIN) at the time.

With the potency of the central idea diminishing, Escape still manages the tricky move of carrying on a story that really should have ended with the last film, while setting up the series' mythology and paving the way for future chapters. But it's still a dilution.

The utterance of the three gentle chimpanzees in Escape from the Planet of the Apes tends to blow you out of the cinema seat, not so much because they can talk as because they all speak the same language.

It's a long way down from even the second in the series.