You've come a long way since MVP: Most Valuable Primate, baby!
By: Brian Long
I've often lamented the Hollywood trend remaking and rebooting films as well as creating superfluous prequels that add nothing to the original story (seriously, have you seen the trailer for The Thing prequel? It looks like the exact same movie except they replaced Kurt Russel with a chick). However, every once in awhile they get it right. Rise of the Planet of the Apes takes us back to the beginning and explains how those damn dirty apes came to be the ruling species as we saw in the original Planet of the Apes. The new film (thankfully) avoids the timey wimey, wibbledy wobbledy time paradox that was established in the original franchise as the explanation for the apes dominance (for more, here's a chart!) and instead gives us the kind of philosophical science fiction that this film series is known for. The film revolves around scientific whiz Will Rodman (James Franco) who has found a wonder cure for Alzheimer's disease. Of course, something goes wrong and Rodman finds himself in the care of one particular chimp by the name of Caesar (a stunning Andy Serkis). The fantastic direction on the part of Rupert Wyatt and the amazing work of the WETA special effects team bring Caesar to life in ways you have never seen from a wholly digital character before. Your heart can't help but break as Caesar-still with the naivete of a child-slowly discovers the world around him and the way he interacts with Rodman's Alzheimer's suffering father (John Lithgow) packs more emotional punch than I've seen from many flesh and blood actors.
In fact, that's where my biggest criticism of the film comes from, the real people. Many of the actors trod through their scenes as if they know they ain't the stars of this picture. Thankfully, the film realizes this too and spends much of the focus on Caesar and his adjustments from curious chimp to a revolutionary. Andy Serkis, who is no stranger to motion capture with his memorable turn as Gollum in the Lord of the Rings films, gives the performance of his career. His physicality as a chimp is incredible and so much is said simply through his body language. When Caeser realizes how truly cruel the outside world can be, we see through simply his posture and facial expressions that this is no longer the wide-eyed chimp who spent his days pining for freedom in Rodman's attic.
The script by Rick Jaffa and Amanda also does a fantastic job of not only establishing our future ape overlords as likable and sympathetic characters, but they also come up with a clever way to even the playing field between human and apes that makes it entirely believable that every ape from Chimpan-a to Chimpan-zee could take over our Earth. And after watching this film, you might believe that we deserve it.
3 out of 4 stars (and any movie that gives me the chance to make numerous references to this is okay in my book).
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