Rise of the Planet of the Apes Movie. Download or Watch Online.

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Genres:	ActionThrillerDr
Starring:	Brian Cox, James Franco, John Lithgow, David Oyelowo, Ty Olsson, Tyler Labine, Freida Pinto
Director(s):	Rupert Wyatt
Available Quality:	DivX, Hi Def, Hi Def
Country:	USA
Year:	2011
IMDB Rating:	7.7
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An origin story set in present day San Francisco, where mans own experiments with genetic engineering lead to the development of intelligence in apes and the onset of a war for supremacy.

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Visitor Reviews: (20)

21 February 2012

Excellent film

Excellent effects. Moral story, not just another sci fi blow up movie.Andy Serkis computer generated performance deserves an Oscar nomination.Best music soundtrack of the year.Not to be missed.Human beings are basically evil and greedy.

max widner 21 February 2012

A fitting prequel. All of the in-between knockoffs are irrelevant

If you were alive and a teen or adult in 1968 you will remember thegroundbreaking movie Planet of the Apes. It was the movie that everyonewas talking about. People were stunned. Those days were full ofturmoil. The day after it was released, Martin Luther King Jr. wasassassinated. Viet Nam was still a monster on the horizon.Charlton Heston descended from his mount and beat the wet sand on thebeach as he screamed at his descendants who had blown it all to hell.He had battled the damn dirty apes only to realize that it was his ownkind that had destroyed the world. Zoom forward through the decades to the present day and see the worldaround you. Medical breakthroughs and technology that surpasses othermovies of that time such as 2001: A Space Odyssey. See the advancementsand see what was sacrificed. There are now medical advancements thatextend human life at the expense of hundreds of thousands of sentientcreatures who happen to have been born without opposable thumbs and thedeveloped brain lobes that give them dominance over every other lessercreature. The lab animals suffer for the humans and they don't know whythey're being tortured.When I first heard the plot of Rise, the first thing that came to mindwas; how can a handful of intelligent apes take over the world? Therejust aren't that many. A small town police force could take them allout within an hour.After seeing the movie I have had all questions answered. This isanother breakthrough movie. Its state of the art CGI that will astoundand it should be taken as a tribute to the state of the art. Becausemovies are just that, art.The first part of the movie is human tragedy, the son desperatelyseeking a cure for Alzheimer's as his father slips away. There issadness that will tug at everybody's heart as Caesar is separated fromthe only human home he has ever known. Man's inhumanity to the man-likecreatures is brutal. Many scenes pay homage to the original and givecomedic relief, such as one scene that flashes by where Caesar isbuilding a model of the Statue of Liberty.Then when the apes rise up, the audience is rooting for them. It's theexact opposite of the original Planet of the Apes where the apes werethe oppressors. The questions are answered at the very end in the credits. That is whenit all fits together and it becomes apparent that Rise of the Planet ofthe Apes is an appropriate prequel bookend to the original Planet ofthe Apes. All of the other in-between knockoffs are irrelevant.

Damion J. Rowan 20 February 2012

Another Horrible Ape Instalment

Despite being a huge fan of James Franco, when the trailers started forthis film, the seventh instalment of the "Planet of the Apes"franchise, all I could think was "Really?" I was sure it was aguaranteed flop. Then the film got released and not only was it one ofthe biggest blockbusters of the year, there were numerous critics whoPRAISED this film.And I cannot begin to figure out why.I had absolutely no interest in this film at all, especially with the2001 remake having been such a joke, but found myself curious enough towatch it on a long flight between California and Hawaii. Seeing it wasfree, and I had nothing but time to waste, I thought sitting through itwould at least give me the right to an opinion rather than blindlypassing judgement. But my assumption of the film was right. It isabsolute crap.Franco plays a scientist developing a serum to combat Alzheimer's anddecides to try testing on chimps. Long story short, the serum is soeffective, the chimps figure out how to break out of the lab and takeover the Golden Gate Bridge. Yeah, all those action scenes you saw inthe trailer? Every single one is from the last fifteen to twentyminutes of the film.And although the special effects are impressive enough, that, in noway, makes up for the rest of this ridiculously cheesy and horriblefilm.Even monkeys would be smart enough to avoid this one. So maybe thatdoes prove that chimps are actually smarter than the movie-goingmasses. Watching a film about a man trying to cure Alzheimer's actuallymanaged to make me feel like a moron for having thought this film mightactually have some merit.

Sebastian1966 20 February 2012

Rise of the Planet of the Apes makes the franchise fresh and relevant again

Let me start by saying I am a hardcore fan of the original Planet ofthe Apes franchise (the 1968-73 movies, and the two TV series thatfollowed). It was my first 'franchise' love (this was pre-Star Wars, ifthat's conceivable). I had the Mego Apes treehouse playset as a kid andmany of the other toys. The first POTA movie was (and is) a classic.The sequels that followed were of varying degrees of quality (somebetter; some worse). The Tim Burton movie.... oh, to hell with it. Idon't want to spoil my good mood, so let's just forget that one, OK? "Rise of the Planet of the Apes" is (more or less) a direct prequel tothe 1968 POTA movie. To be more accurate, it is not only a prequel tothe 1968 POTA, but also an interesting sideways remake of one of theoriginal movie's sequels, "Conquest of the Planet of the Apes", from1972. In that film, we saw the young talking ape Caesar (playedmemorably by the late Roddy McDowell) lead apes in a slave revolt inthe far off future year of (*ahem*) 1991. But whether you view "Rise" as prequel/remake or beginning of a newfranchise, this movie delivers a rush of new blood and energy to thePOTA franchise. The special effects seem effortless (some of the mostmoving, heartfelt motion capture performances I've ever seen, not tomention the rich texturing of the ape fur and their expressive faces;Weta has outdone their previous work). But despite the easy-to-take-for-granted technology on display, the humanity of the movie(ironic in a movie about apes) permeates every frame. This may in fact,be the best film I've seen this year so far; certainly this summer.It's intelligent science fiction with action scenes that are REALLYinvested in the characters' fates and outcomes (both human and simian). James Franco turns in another great performance ("127 Hours" was nofluke), and John Lithgow turns in an alternating sweet-natured andpainfully heartbreaking performance as Franco's dad; whose strugglewith Alzheimer's is the impetus for his son's research. Andy Serkis(the motion performer for Caesar the chimp) should REALLY be nominatedfor an Academy Award. His Caesar is an absolutely STUNNING performanceachievement (motion capture or otherwise). Only Frieda Pinto gets a bitshortchanged as Franco's veterinarian girlfriend.For the loyal POTA fan (which I am) there are TONS of throwawayreferences to the original; a female chimp referred to as "Cornelia"(after Cornelius, Roddy McDowell's ape from the first POTA movie;McDowell starred in four of the five original movies as well as thesubsequent live-action TV show), and Caesar's mother is called 'brighteyes' (another 1968 POTA gag). There's a wise old orangutan named"Maurice" who learned sign language in a circus (named after Dr Zaiusactor Maurice Evans), and another ape named 'Buck' (after after actorBuck Kartalian; another veteran of the original movie series). And theonline rumor is true; we do indeed see the launch of Heston's spaceshipfrom the first movie (the Icarus; apparently she was bound for Marswhen she entered her relativistic time warp) and we read in a laternewspaper headline that she's 'lost in space.' The movie also does a nice job of 'cleaning up' some of the naggingcontinuity errors that plagued the original Apes' film series (from1968-73). Mankind's downfall ties in more directly with the fate of theapes now, rather than a nuclear war (which would've presumably killedapes as well as humans). But despite a little bit of 'retconning' withthe original (remember; even the original movie's sequels never gottheir own timeline straight), I was more surprised by how well thismovie dovetailed with so much of the 1968 original. Several of Heston'sclassic lines are spoken by a sadistic zookeeper (yes, this characteris a bit of a clichÃ©, but he serves a vital function in the film). Thezookeeper's name is Dodge Landon (named after Heston's two astronautcompanions in the original). Heston himself even appears on a TV screenin a scene from "The Agony and the Ecstasy." So there are rewards forthe loyal POTA fan, but these bits will not lose anyone who isunfamiliar with the franchise. Oh, and DON'T LEAVE when the end creditsstart... trust me (you'll miss vital information on the direction for apotential sequel).It's impressive how the filmmakers were able to so nimbly walk the fineline between being loyal but not slavish to the original films; usingwhat works, and discarding what doesn't. By doing a bit of Star Trek2009-style tweaking with the POTA franchise, "Rise" makes the POTAfranchise a viable entertainment for 21st century audiences who mightbe put off by the 1968 movie's perhaps vaunted (yet deserved) classicstatus. Sometimes tinkering with a classic can be challenging, but thisfilm (sleekly and smartly directed by Rupert Wyatt) does so with aneasy confidence. "Rise" truly exceeded my expectations. A solid 9 out of 10.

Marc Davis 19 February 2012

Not a classic, but still a great movie

I think one of the reasons why the original Planet of the Apes in 1968was so good was because back then, special effects were so non-existentthat films had to rely more on plot, deep character development, andthe skill of great actors like Charlton Heston. With that said, I likedthe Rise of the Planet of the Apes, because (while it's no classic likethe original film) it manages to capture some of the old school formulathat made the original so great.I'll admit that this film is rather too slow for my tastes, but it'sslow because it needs to be. Trust me, there's nothing more powerfuland moving than when you first hear a chimpanzee talk, screaming"NOOOOOOOO" to the top of his lungs at a surprised handler at an apefacility. It comes late in the movie, but man, it's worth the longbuild up. You see, while James Franco gets top billing for this film,no human is the main character as in the original Planet of the Apes orits remake in 2001 starring Mark Wahlberg. The star here is Caesar(Andy Serkis), a baby chimp taken in by a young scientist by the nameof Will Rodman (Franco) doing research for a cure of Alzheimer'sdisease. Caesar's mother is killed after an experiment goes haywire,where she's injected with a substance that increases intelligence. Youmight have guested it, the substance is pasted along to Caesar and hesoon develops more and more human-like characteristics. It also helpsthat Caesar is raised in Will's home, which he shares with his parents.As with the original movie, there is plenty of character developmenthere and we actually care about Caesar and his fate, not to mention wedevelop a soft spot for the bound that the chimp shares with Will'sfather (John Lithgow), who if you haven't also guessed it, is sufferingfrom Alzheimer's.The only downsides to this movie are that the various primates in themovie look decidedly digital. I prefer the actual primate costumes thatwere used in the previous Planet of the Apes movies. The ending wasrather abrupt, and only seemed to serve as nothing more than the set upfor a sequel. Also, Franco's role towards the end was pretty muchmeaningless. They could have just as easily written him off the last 20minutes and been just fine. What a waste of a talented actor.

19 February 2012

Serkis is the best; the script is pretty good

Andy Serkis can do more acting with eyes than other actors can with their entire bodies. He was the perfect choice to play the enhanced ape Caesar, while Lithgow and Franco play his "family" members. The action and drama never stop, which is a credit to the screenwriters as well as to the directors; also, the CGI apes are very believable.Just one thing: the apes get to run free at the end, but they don't take over the world. Not even one city. So do they "rise" in the next film?

19 February 2012

Loved this movie!

This review is from: Rise Of The Planet of the Apes (Amazon Instant Video) I wasn't sure I wanted to watch this movie, but after reading the reviews here I decided to go ahead and rent it. I am glad I did, because I loved it. Very well written and the apes were realistic (except for the human emotions they displayed), but that is what helped to make this movie so good. A must see!!

savagebiscuits 18 February 2012

It could have been worse... it could have been better.

OK, let's start by saying that this film is quite reasonable, in factI'd put it just above that. Now, the reason I say this is because thefilm gets the most important thing right: it makes sure that we connectwith the main character, Caesar. We get to care about him, feel whenhe's in pain, and root for him when he finally organises a rebellion.Despite being a CGI creation, we, as viewers, are shown something thatfeels real. No, not in the tangible sense, for the CGI does fail a fewtimes (not often), but in that we come to see the character as one thatpossesses depth. I have to admit to being fairly impressed with AndySerkis and the animators in rendering Caesar better than I thought itwould be. Yay for Caesar! However, I have to also say that thefollowing is far less than praise.***WARNING! The following might annoy fanboys!*** ;)Now, Caesar is fine, the character we care for, his pain is our pain,etc. Good, that's the important thing that they had to get right.Without that, the film would be a failure. However, that doesn't meanthat just because they've created a well rendered main character who isCGI, full of emotions and connections, that they should just stop thereand think their job is done. See, I have to say that all the humancharacters in this film are fairly weak and one-dimensional. Thevillains tend to be black-and-white caricatures, simplistic and hollow.The original series of PotA had villains, but most of them were fairlyrounded, not all pure "evil" (Doctor Zaius and Doctor Hasslein, eventhough they can be seen as generally the villains of the piece in thefilms that they were in, have their reasons for what they're doing;they're not purely "evil", so to speak), but it seems that that is abit too complex for today's audience, so we're given easy to despise"baddies", who act in ways that seem as subtle as a Michael Bay film.Another thing is that the acting of the humans isn't up to much. Mostof the actors don't really seem to be trying. Franco looks bored, Pintoseems lost wondering what to do, Felton seems like he still thinks he'sin the Harry Potter set near Watford, while Lithgow, although he doesthrow some acting punches now and then, does seem like he could dobetter. Then again, the script doesn't help the human characters, so Isuppose that doesn't help the actors.Another problem with this film, especially if you want to compare it tothe originals, is that it's fairly light in its political message andscience fiction concepts. I'm not sure that the idea that society hasmoved on is a good justification for such weaknesses. There are plentyof hard hitting issues in the world that still need looking at, evenones that still affect us today like they did in the 1960s. Theoriginal series of films might not be the most intelligent films evermade, but they did try to come up with some thought behind them, andwere certainly, at least in the case of the first film, intelligentlywritten. Rise, unfortunately, seems to just push the "don't be cruel toanimals" line as well as the "don't meddle with genetics", which seemsto me to lack the impact of the social issues that the original filmswere tackling. I don't buy the excuse that things have moved on andthat serious topics won't have a resonance.Still, all the above isn't to say that the film is bad. Far from it,but I just think it could have been better handled. I think there weretoo many compromises in trying to satisfy non-PotA fans out there,giving us a watered down version. However, even though it's watereddown (IMO, naturally), it still keeps interest as a film. The apes arethe interesting ones, and I suppose it got that right. Once it got tothe apes, the film gets impressive, earning respect. The story as astory was worth telling, despite its limitations.Does it deserve a sequel? Yes, I think it deserves sequels; it's doneenough for me to warrant that. I also think that a sequel to this storywill bring about a more compelling one, with various conflicts betweenman and ape, and even those within the apes, bringing in more anglesand points of interest. It's difficult to start off a series like this,particularly when you know roughly where it's going to lead, so in someways I should be more forgiving towards Rise. Maybe they'll also beable to explore more weightier themes in the sequels, because theymight well be given the chance to with new story ideas. Still, that's abig maybe, and probably a stretch.So, please go and watch this film. It's not fantastic, it's notrubbish, it's more a popcorn film but on the better end of thespectrum. Enjoyable, but brain is optional.

17 February 2012

pre-ordered this, was first in my town to buy a ticket for the first movie

This review is from: Rise of the Planet of the Apes (Two-Disc Edition Blu Ray + DVD/Digital Copy Combo) [Blu-ray] (Blu-ray) very awesome movies, I have always enjoyed Planet of the Apes. Can't wait to see it on blu-ray and 7.1 surround sound, should be awesome as usual.

Andrew Marshall 17 February 2012

How it all started

I'm probably fairly unusual in that I saw the original Planet of theApes film during it's theatrical release. The big question that wasalways unanswered from the original film was how it all started. TheRise of the Planet of the Apes attempts to answer this.I must confess to finding the film quite enjoyable, but some of thespecial effects/set pieces were a little unnecessary. The plot is quitereasonable and all of the actors seem comfortable in their roles. Thereisn't a stand out performance as per Charlon Heston in the originalfilm, but there aren't too many Charlton Heston's around these days. Ican't say I found it compelling viewing, but it was a pleasant enoughway to spend a couple of hours.

16 February 2012

Good in different ways than I was expecting.

**** May be spoilers below. Only little things. I will not put anything big or important!!!!****This was a neat movie. I either have never seen or do not remember the originals, so I can not compare it. The movie is about a scientist who is trying to find a cure for Alzheimer's. Which is a disease that his father has. He tests the cure out on Monkeys, to see what happens to them. He finds that it makes them much smarter and gives them the ability to do things that they could not do before. The group that is giving him the money towards his research comes in to hear about what he has and needs. He will show them how the medicine works by showing them what the test monkey can do. Something happens and the monkey goes crazy. It tares apart the offices and starts to attack them. They have no choice but to kill the ape and all the others that they are doing the tests on. The monkey that went crazy may leave something behind that carries the advantage that the new medicine gave him. The scientist takes the monkey home for a short time at first, until he can find a place to keep it from being killed. Years go by and the monkey has grown. Through out the movie you see the monkey starts wondering where it came from and it all it is thought of is an animal. Eventually, the monkey may go somewhere else to live and decides that it is time to free himself and the others.There you go, that is the movie. You really feel the emotions of the monkey or all of the monkeys. They did a good job of showing you that some wanted peace and freedom, while others wanted power and control. The monkeys actually seem to have personalities. You will be surprised by the fact that you feel like you know them and understand what they want and why they are angry. It is like they are people. Very well done in that regard. The problems that I had with the movie are these. All the main action in the movie. Be it the monkeys attacking or escaping, happens in the last 20 or 30 minutes. The first main part of the movie is all about how the problems started and what happens from them. I still thought the movie was a lot of fun and worth seeing. But this is one of those movies that I could watch once and it could and probably would have been a smarter choice to see it at home. If you think about it, it is a good thing that they did not make a movie that was all apes killing people. They took the time to build up to what would happen. Another thing that kind of bothered me was this. For anything that the monkeys did or would do. The things that you know would have happened to them did not. I do not want to give anything away. It was just a weak, strange ending. The movie was slow, fast and action packed, then back to slow. If you are wanted to see 100% fast paced action, this may not be for you. But, my mom, step brother and I did enjoy it. So it was good for that. This is not a movie I could ever see myself buying. Once was enough for me. It was a good movie with a little less of this and that than I thought there would be.

16 February 2012

Great Movie Finally Giving the Apes Saga Justice!

This is a review of the movie itself, not of the quality of the DVD or Blue-ray. I admit I was impressed. I was a bit worried that Hollywood would attempt to cram in too much in this "prequel" but they didn't. They addressed the two main concerns that I'm sure all Planet of the Apes fans had on their minds: how do the apes come into power and what happens to the humans. Neither of these was over dramatized, and both were completely believable.James Franco plays Will Rodman, a doctor who is working on a drug to cure Alzheimer's. His father, played by John Lithgow, is suffering from it. Just when experiments on chimps is making great progress, an accident happens and the head of the research facility shuts the lab down. He orders the chimps to be put down, but one of the assistants discovers a baby chimp in one of the cages and sends it home with Will. Will continues to develop the drug and to track the baby chimp's intelligence, which was passed on from his mother. Will names the baby Caesar.Three years later Will's father is improving because he's been given the drug, but he soon begins to lapse because his immune system starts to fight off the virus. Will talks the research facility into trying a new strain of virus, but when one doctor is exposed to it we soon learn that the new virus is harmful to humans. Meanwhile, Caesar is shipped off to a primate facility after an accident involving a neighbor, where he meets other chimps for the first time and his army is soon formed.Once these two story lines are set up, there's a good thirty minutes of nonstop action as the primates plan and carry out their escape. Before you know it, the movie is over! But like I said before, it isn't pushed too far and the ending was quite satisfying to me. My only complaint about the movie is that the CGI effects with Caesar in some places is a bit fake looking, but most of the time it looks great. I'm sure they pushed their limits here in order to give Caesar those closer-to-human qualities and emotions, which actually do tug at your heart strings as they were probably intended to do.Lots of emotion! Lots of action! A very satisfying story which is exactly what Apes finally needed on the big screen!

15 February 2012

Very Realistic - Held My Interest Throughout

This review is from: Rise Of The Planet of the Apes (Amazon Instant Video) Rise Of The Planet of the Apes has the most realistic special effects of any other movie I've seen. James Franco portrays Ceasar's owner, who is responsible for the ape's extreme intelligence. Andy Serkis plays Ceasar by the process of advanced motion capture and does an amazing job. You can almost believe the apes are real. The title is misleading, in that it seems to indicate this movie is a continuation of Planet of the Apes but is in no way related. I enjoyed the movie and thought the acting was very good. Andy Serkis should receive an award for performing the motion capture in this movie.

abigail546 15 February 2012

Eeh- Depends on your taste

For starters, I have never seen the original Planet of the Apes, or the2001 re-make, so this could be influencing my opinion. When the trailerfirst came out, I didn't want to see it, but I wouldn't have gone outof my way not to see it. I had no expectations for it. But I wasplanning on going to see a movie, with no preference, so I saw thatthis movie had, at first received a 7.8/10.0, and then increased to an8.0/10.0. So, I thought I might actually enjoy it, given that themajority of movies I have seen with an 8.0/10.0 rating on IMDb werequite good. However, I was not that impressed with the overall movie.The plot summery was well thought out, I don't know if the explanationas to how the apes had grown so intelligent in the original film ornovel, but I felt it gave a solid reason for the apes later advancedcivilization. However, some parts just seemed just too unoriginal forthe depth of, how I felt, the film was aiming for. This may have beento help attract a larger audience, but I just didn't believe a fewparts fit. I felt as though it could have just been scripted to havemore emotion and depth, and that the director and writers didn't fullyachieve this. While the director and writers did approach this verywell, I just felt like more could have been done. Overall, if you'renot looking for every aspect of how a film comes together, and mostlyonly trying to catch a random good movie, this is probably What youwould enjoy.

Jim Gilligan 14 February 2012

A worthy addition to the Apes oeuvre

I admit that I'm a huge "Planet of the Apes" fan. As a child, I lovedall of the original films, and I even "went Ape for a day" when movietheaters showed all 5 original Apes films back-to-back in one day backin the mid-1970s. I'm also a fan of the Tim Burton "Planet of the Apes"film (which is far more faithful to the source novel than the others).So it was with a sense of trepidation that I viewed this latest"re-imagining." As it turns out, my fears were for naught. This film,which pretty much reconceptualizes "Conquest of the Planet of the Apes"(the 4th film in the original franchise), is a smart, exciting, andsurprisingly sophisticated take on how humanity could engineer its owndemise at the hands of another species. James Franco is solid in thelead as a researcher with a strong sense of ethics and a passion todevelop a cure for Alzheimer's, a disease that plagues his father,played by the always brilliant John Lithgow. The real star of thisfilm, however, is Andy Serkis, who gives life to Caesar, the chimpanzeewho is torn between his love for humanity and his duty to hisspeciesÂand whose performance is surely worthy of an Oscar nomination.Don't worry if this all sounds a bit hokeyÂit plays a lot better thanit sounds. Add a star if you're a die-hard "Apes" fan.

Framescourer 14 February 2012

Slick storytelling

A thoroughly entertaining sci-fi thriller, intended as a prequel to thecelebrated but patchy Planet Of The Apes sci-fi canon. The film is anoutstanding exemplar of brisk, no-nonsense storytelling and a supercase for the continued use of motion-capture as a process for puttingcomputer generated images on the screen. Inevitably, the onecomplements the other: the excellent acting and digital rendering ofthat acting means that the story can be told with great economy -through the images on screen, without having to burden the script.So, once again Andy Serkis impresses as a non-human, as well as RichardRidings' silverback, Buck, and the sagacious Maurice of Karin Konoval.I don't think it's inevitable that the humans should be less engagingbut they are notably slight characters in comparison. I think FreidaPinto's trope-vet/love interest is just written on auto-pilot but DavidOyelowo has been better than this on British TV. He neither reallycommunicates his disingenuity nor a real, money-grabbing steel. Francois winsome but anonymous as the principal scientist. Whilst I'm on theweaker stuff, I have to shrug a bit over Patirck Doyle's score:functional but obvious.Rupert Wyatt's film is much more than the sum of imbalanced partsthough and whisks you through familiar narrative territory with somereal panache. 8/10

13 February 2012

All Hail Caesar!!

Being a 5-year-old huge fan of this franchise, I couldn't wait for another sequel.Rise of the Planet of the Apes is far superior than the last one, due to its rich detail in storytelling, acting, and sheer special ground-breaking special effects of this new type of Avatar-type apes. Brilliant!Andy Serkis and the whole crew deserve Oscars for their acting, directing, and solid special effects. Although I liked Tim Burton's film, it didn't have the emotional impact nor the true vision that this newest one did. Mark Whalberg wasn't the right actor for that job. Needed someone with bigger acting chops. The ape actors and their make-up stole the show - hands down.But Rise rises to all occasions, explaining just how this whole circus freak show of a franchise all started. I can't wait until its bigger, more sci-fi-ish post-apocalyptic sequel.

markdroulston 13 February 2012

The next leap forward in effects..

There have been certain movies since the inception of digital effectsthat stand out for their use of new technology to assist thestorytelling. Jurassic Park made us believe in dinosaurs. So much ofThe Lord of the Rings films hinged on Gollum, a CG performance-capturedcharacter. Avatar created an incredibly lush and dense alien world,populated with bizarre, photo-realistic creatures. In 2011, RupertWyatt's cumbersomely titled Rise of the Planet of the Apes representsthe next leap forward in cinema effects. There is a human story here,but Wyatt wisely leaves it more or less in the background. and focusesthe film on its strongest element: Andy Serkis as Caesar.Rise builds audience sympathy for the ape characters right from theopening scene. Make no mistake, what happens later on in the story isour fault, the end product of insatiable human greed. The events of thefilm progress in a fairly by the numbers fashion, and anyone familiarat all with the Apes series knows where it's going, yet Wyatt andSerkis manage to surprise by crafting easily the most interesting anddeveloped character of the blockbuster season, and arguably the entireyear thus far. This film is all Caesar's, and the work done by Serkisand the wizards at Weta is truly remarkable. It was a risky propositionto make Caesar a completely CG character; if the effect didn't work,the whole film wouldn't work. Building on what they had done previouslyin The Lord of the Rings and King Kong, Weta and Serkis achieve whatwas though by some impossible, making Caesar and the other apes 100percent believable, not just in look, but in emotion. Wyatt, fearlesslyinviting close scrutiny of the digital characters, focuses a great dealon the eyes of the apes, and when Caesar looks at James Franco or JohnLithgow, you really feel the connection between them. When the Oscarnominations are announced in January, is it possible that Serkis willget a nod for supporting actor? Probably not, but the strength of hisperformance is sure to spark debate about the legitimacy ofperformance-captured animated characters. More so than Rings or Avatar,Rise really shows what the technology is capable of, and it seems thatthe uncanny valley is ever so much closer to being bridged. Whether ornot Weta can work their magic on a human character remains to be seen,but the potential is definitely there, and it's exciting. As for thereal human characters, Lithgow stands out as always, but Franco, FreidaPinto, and particularly Tom Felton as a sadistic ape handler deliverfairly forgettable performances. They do what they have to do, butWyatt knows where the film needs to spend its time, and their storynever gets in the way of Caesar's journey from adorable orphan tocalculating revolutionary. It's a shame that 20th Century Fox'smarketing department felt it necessary to alter the film's title, asthe original title Caesar is much more appropriate.Technical achievements aside, Rise is also a surprisingly effectivesummer action film. Whereas the majority of reboots/remakes come off asa little unnecessary, Wyatt and writers Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silverreally seem like they have something to say, and the climax of the filmleft me quite genuinely conflicted in my morals. The subtext of thefilm asks some big questions about genetic engineering and animalrights, and what our response should be to protect ourselves fromnature's fury. Obviously the events in the film are pushed to anextreme level, but the human response seems rather realistic, and it'snot something we should be proud of.This is how franchise filmmaking should be done. Using outstandingtechnical mastery to tell a challenging and exciting story, Rise of thePlanet of the Apes ends blockbuster season on a high note, and sets asolid foundation for further stories in this universe. The Apes seriesseemed dead in the water after Tim Burton's awful 2001 remake, butRupert Wyatt and his team have reinvigorated it into somethingrelevant, topical and thrilling.tinribs27.wordpress.com

12 February 2012

Unique, Powerful, Breathtaking...Fantastic Film!

I really enjoyed watching this movie...it made me appreciate all of the effort that everyone, but especially Andy Serkis and the special effects team, put into making Ceasar and the entire movie as real and meaningful as possible. Overall, Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes is a beautiful and striking movie with great moments of emotion and thoughtfulness...I can't wait to see what Andy Serkis and James Franco do next...truly skilled actors who are fantastic to watch and support!!