Note: the following review may contain mild spoilers. Skip to the last paragraph if you don't want to know ANYTHING about the film until you see it.
I've never been familiar with the
Planet Of The Apes series. All I've seen was a little bit of Tim Burton's 2001 remake of the original, and what I saw wasn't very impressive. So obviously, I wasn't initially looking forward to the reboot/prequel when it was announced. With a tongue-twisting title, an unusual premise, and a mostly unknown cast, it was easy to give the film a miss. But after watching the trailers/TV spots and seeing the film get a lot of positive reception (the film's currently at 82% on Rotten Tomatoes as we speak), my interest sky-rocketed, so I decided to check the film out. Was it worth it? Absolutely.
Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes is more of a remake of one of the original films,
Conquest Of The Planet Of The Apes, which had a very similar premise about the rise of the apes.
Rise... follows scientist Will Rodman (James Franco) discovering a cure for Alzheimer's disease and tests it on a chimpanzee (who would later die after having a son), and he later adopts the son, calling him Caesar (Andy Serkis with motion capture) and raising him as he would his own son. However, after an accident several years later, Caesar is moved to a primate facility, where he manages to escape and find a newer version of the virus that increases chimp intelligence, which is used on the rest of the apes at the facility. The apes all escape and invade the city, marking the rise of the planet of the apes (Sorry, I just had to say it).
First off, the effects for this film are astonishing. Developed by the same company who did the effects for
Avatar, the effects for the apes are excellent, with actors playing the chimps via motion capture. Andy Serkis (who also used motion capture to play King Kong in Peter Jackson's remake and voiced Gollum in the
Lord Of The Rings trilogy) is fantastic as main chimp Caesar, and I'm hoping that the Oscar buzz about his performance will be worth it come next year.
The rest of the cast is very solid. James Franco has been one of my favorite actors since his role as Harry Osborn in the
Spider-Man trilogy, and he plays Will Rodman very well. Freida Pinto is also good as Caroline, while John Lithgow was nearly perfect as the elder Rodman. Tom Felton (best known for his performance in the
Harry Potter movies) surprisingly gives a strong performance as Dodge Robinson (who mistreats the apes in the facility from which they escape), delivering the menacing, cruel attitude that's necessary for the character.
Script-wise, the film surprisingly delivers strongly, being nearly perfect. The characters are believable, and I forgot about how odd the premise sounded at first when actually seeing it come to life. Seeing the apes battle the humans in the final battle is rather breathtaking, and it's fun seeing the chimps pissed off. Also, it's been a while since I've seen a film so emotional, and it's very easy to feel for Caesar (that's how convincing Serkis' portrayal was).
When it comes to flaws, it's hard to think of any in particular. At 105 minutes or so, it does seem a bit short at times, but does its job at developing the characters enough, so there really isn't anything lacking in terms of development or story. At the same time, I can't really give it a perfect rating (as much as I'd love to, the film doesn't seem like a five-star movie to me).
In the end,
Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes really surprised me. With solid acting, dazzling effects, and plenty of emotion bleeding through, this is one film I can say is one of the best of the year (I'd say it's in my top five for 2011 at the moment). As said before, I haven't seen any of the previous
Apes films, so I can't really compare this one to its predecessors, but
Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes works well as a stand-alone story, and I'm definitely looking forward to a sequel in this new series.
I rate
Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes 4.5 out of 5 stars.