Walhberg's low key performance

I've seen many roles where I liked Wahlberg such as movies like Boogie Nights, The Departed, and Rock Star. I thought he did some decent work in those movies. I thought his work in this film was putrid. He should have overplayed the role not underplayed it like he did. Is anyone really that cool of a customer. Even Clint Eastwood would have been surprised by the circumstances. I kept thinking his low key performance was just his shock at the fact that he landed and was captive and a servant for apes that could talk. That he was so shocked he could barely speak. But it wasn't. He just really wasn't all that surprised by the fact that he landed on, was a captive of, and was made a servant of apes that could talk. "What kind of a planet is this" he asks at one point. This was his reaction? What? Compare it with Heston who was blown away by his realization that he was on a planet dominated by talking apes. The scene where they are all running from the gorillas while being hunted in that cornfield (or whatever kind of field it was) was absolutely brilliant. You knew it was going to be the apes (because the name of the movie was Planet of the Apes, hint hint) yet, the anticipation of seeing the apes, and Heston's reaction was priceless. Even James Franciscus's reaction in Beneath the Planet of the Apes was better than Wahlberg's.

Then again, maybe it's not Wahlberg's fault. Maybe he was directed to play it that way by Burton. All I know is it was a mistake and a real let down. It was Wahlberg's job to convey to me exactly how nuts the situation he found himself in really was. He failed. "Ho, hum..oh by the way, I'm on a planet inhabited by apes that can talk, and live in a relative modern society where they dominate humans...ho hum......"