Rise of the Planet of the Apes

I love the Planet of the Apes. I admit it; as a matter of fact I have always admitted it. I like all of them. Even the 2001 Tim Burton fiasco that not too many people what to admit happened.

I recently attended an event at the Drafthouse that they called Day of the Apes. Now what that was a marathon on one Sunday morning that began with the first Planet of the Apes flick starring Charlton Heston and Roddy McDowell, followed by Beneath the Planet of the Apes, Escape from the Planet of the Apes, Then Conquest of the Planet of the Apes and ending with Battle for Planet of the Apes.

Now of those flicks the one that I want to talk about is Conquest. Many consider it the best in the series, second only to the original. I have to admit that I like this flick more than the others in the series.

Conquest is the tale of the real origin of the Planet. The story is that a plague has killed off all of the dogs and cats on Earth and mankind’s pets have been replaced by apes. Eventually Apes are made into slaves and are forced to do meaningless tasks and are beaten and abused for disobeying. That is until Caesar comes along and after hearing of the death of his friend and caretaker (Ricardo Montalban) arranges a revolution that results in the Apes taking over the world with the line
“Tonight we have seen the birth of the Planet of the Apes.”

When that line was said at the screening the whole theatre erupted into applause.

This year has seen the release of the Remake/Reboot of that flick.
Rise of the Planet of the Apes.

Now this flick is not a prequel to the 2001 Ape flick this is a reboot of the Ape series.

The story follows James Franco as a scientist trying to find the cure for Alzheimer’s that his father is suffering. He is experimenting on a drug/virus on Chimpanzees that result in one chimp going crazy. (Anyone else reminded of Deep Blue Sea) It is then revealed that this chimpanzee had a baby and was pregnant while the tests were conducted. That baby becomes Caesar an super smart simian that sadly is placed in a zoo like shelter where he is mistreated by the caretakers and begins to start a revolution. That is all I want to say about the plot because there are some cool twists that I don’t want to give away right now.

Now I have to say there is some damn good CGI at play here in this flick. Sometimes I thought that I was watching the 2005 King Kong flick especially when I saw Andy Serkis in the role of Caesar.

The story also kept me interested in the fact that I did not feel that I have seen all of this before, in the fact that the new material is fresh and relevant and a brand new story to an old tale.

The acting is great especially from James Franco and John Lithgow. I was also enjoying the rest of the cast comprising mostly of lesser known but familiar faces from Television and other Sci-Fi flicks.

The use of references to the previous Ape flicks I also loved.

7 Dead Humans
3 Dead Apes
0 Breasts
32 Beasts
1 Explosion
1 Crashed Mustang
Human Fu
Ape Fu
Extra points for making me think that these Apes are smarter than the people in Washington right now.

4 Stars

Check it out.