Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

The Worst Film Ever

A Brilliant Conflict

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

Although there was plenty of room for improvement here, there were a lot of things that I thought this movie did well. When I first saw the trailers back in 2011, it looked to me like the apes were the enemy that was trying to take over the world like in an alien invasion movie. However, I was pleasantly surprised upon finally seeing it this past summer to find that this is not at all an action driven movie. The trailers make it out to be an action movie, but in truth there is only one action scene at the climax. However, there is plenty to keep it interesting and exciting throughout the rest of the movie.The science/medicine/tech corporation that Will worked for felt a little bit standard, much like Oscorp from the Spiderman movies. However, the company was not looking to make any kind of military technology, which is seen in a lot of action movies. Instead, the writers decided to make the serum that makes Caesar smarter a drug that is intended to cure Alzheimers, which I think was a good choice. It made the entire movie feel more real and allowed it to put some more focus on some of the societal issues that come up in it. There is an active search for a cure to Alzheimers, and it is almost a certainty that pharmaceutical companies would test out their cure on animals before humans. Later, when Caesar gives all of the apes the serum, it makes sense that the first thing the apes would think about with their more intelligent minds would be the oppressive circumstances they are in. Even though animal cruelty was not a major theme of the movie, it was at least presented in a way that gave it more attention and made viewers more likely to think about how we treat animals than say the way the Avengers dealt with the Tessaract. The climatic battle also has more weight because the apes are not the aggressors. Rather they are simply trying to escape and live on their own; the fighting only ensues when the police try to stop them. Whether the serum would actually have such an extensive impact on chimps as it does in the movie is unlikely, but choosing to have the drug make the apes smarter rather than more aggressive like some movies might have done was a good choice in my opinion.I also really liked the way that the movie used their graphics and mo-cap when dealing with the apes. Like most computer graphics today, it did not make the apes look like real apes, but it at least looked clean enough that it wasn't distracting. But I especially liked the way that Caesar and the other apes were written, directed, and acted. Most of the times when intelligent animals are featured in movies, they either talk, or make incredibly annoying gestures and noises to make up for not being able to speak (see Curious George, Sven from Frozen, the chicken in Moana, the horses in Mulan and Tangled and El Dorado). Here, Caesar was able to communicate through sign, which is a much more realistic and eloquent way of making him a human character to the audience. Instead of trying to make Caesar overly cute or overly aggressive, they just made him seem more human. This made the moment when he finally speaks so much more powerful, at least for me.There were a few things that I disliked about it. Several shots that were used at the beginning and end of scenes felt rather clichéd and overused, especially as the pace of the movie picked up. Steven Jacobs, the head of the company, felt like kind of a caricature and I got a little annoyed by the way he was written. Last and worst was the young zookeeper Dodge Landon, who felt heinously unrealistic. He's a character that the audience is meant to hate, but I hated him even more because he just felt like a copy of a stereotypical punk, especially in the scene when he brings his friends in to see the apes.On the whole, I liked it and want to see the next two. It's by no means the perfect sci-fi movie, but sci-fi movies should strive to be more like this one. Overall Rating: 7.8/10.

This is a great start to another (and hopefully the last) reboot of a well-known franchise, Planet of the Apes. It's easy to say what definitely stands out: the visual effects. All of the CGI apes are incredibly realistic, especially Caesar (Andy Serkis) who is a terrific masterpiece, not only visually, but as a character as well. He's surprisingly the protagonist of the movie, a decision that I congratulate the director and production team for, because it transformed it into a much more captivating and interesting film.Andy Serkis is the God of motion capture, it's amazing the amount of emotion he's able to transmit as a guy in a spandex suit full of white dots on his face. Caesar is one of the most fantastic and intriguing characters I've ever watched and the fact that there's almost no dialogue throughout the film just proves that you can achieve great things with pure emotion (and some sign language ... ).James Franco is good portraying an also well-developed character, even if he wasn't as great as he could be. The script is very smart and emotional (mainly due to the extremely well-directed no-dialogue scenes) and the action is super awesome, particularly because of its emotional side. The fact that we actually care about the apes (maybe even more than the humans) elevates the action-heavy third act and brings the movie home (no pun intended), with a very strong ending.In spite of all this, it's still not a perfect film. Even if the runtime isn't properly long, the film's pacing (principally the second act) is really slow, which drags the movie into almost a boring state. As I said above, the story is captivating, but only when we're with Caesar and his respective families ... All of the human drama inside the Gen-Sys Laboratories isn't really interesting, but we still get too much of it.Finally, the side characters. Besides Caesar, Will and his father (brilliantly portrayed by John Lithgow), no one else got the chance to shine on the big screen. Most of them are plot devices in order to get the story going and actually have a film: the "bad guys" are just bad because ... Well, they're assholes, I guess they were born that way ... I would have preferred that they spent a little more time with those characters instead of the company's dramas.All in all, Rise of the Planet of the Apes is an excellent start to this reboot that proves we don't need dialogue to transmit a great amount of emotion. The CGI is flawless, Caesar being the huge proof of what a masterpiece looks like, visually and character-wise. A slow pace and some under-developed side characters bring the movie down a bit, but the captivating and emotional story, plus a very well-directed action-heavy third act, elevate the film into one of the best in the whole franchise.MSB Reviews - If you like my reviews, please follow my blog :)

Rise of the Planet of the Apes has become for me an ideal example of fresh, thrilling, spellbinding, emotive, overall perfect cinema. I love this movie, because it is all these things and more. The trailblazing motion- capture, used to artfully capture Andy Serkis' Oscar-worthy performance, laughs (I apologize in advance to the fans of the original franchise) Charlton Heston's 1960's series to shame; Patrick Doyle's score is simple, yet delightful; the pacing is perfect, and the actors well-chosen and talented. This review could well prove painful to me, owing not to any fault of the film in question, but rather to the possibly necessary restraint from droning on interminably to its deserved credit.In most motion pictures, I would judge any which run below, let's say, 100 minutes, as likely lacking the material needed to produce a fully matured movie, and most of the time I would be correct in so doing. Here is evidenced an exception to the rule. At only 104 minutes of running time, that which I would tend to view as a fault is indeed a virtue in this case. The reason for the shorter-than-average blockbuster length is because the story pleading telling requires only that amount of time. Packed jam-full into those 104 minutes is a fantastic adventure, complete with thrills, sorrows, and everything in between. The pacing is beautiful - the film constantly moving along its well-planned trajectory, never feeling either hurried or stalled. It maintains continual interest as every event unfolds. I digress momentarily to add that, without becoming merely a "rung in the ladder", the story, begun so praise worthily in this first installment, maintains its flow as the franchise progresses. In an age in which ideas are forever recycled and served up as sequels with a slightly new flavour to audiences again and again, original series that manage to tell authentic stories should be warmly welcomed. But to return to the topic at hand. The plot is largely believable and convincing, although admittedly the climax pushes credibility, somewhat.Despite a slightly obscure cast, the characters are well-formed and well-played, presenting convincing and realistic performances. Motion capture master Andy Serkis is naturally the champion that holds up the entire premise. Here, in ape realm, Serkis is king. His unmatched emotive talent seems to be perfectly at home as Caesar, and though he has delivered an array of indisputably singular performances as Gollum, Captain Haddock, King Kong and more, Caesar remains my personal favourite and, in my mind, his most organically, authentically, self- made trademark personality. As mentioned, the characters are developed nicely, and I appreciate the practicality the writers employed when they wove the players into the story, not as absolute centrepieces, but well-ordered parts of a whole - clever appendages to the events that shaped the lives of many. One of the beautiful aspects to these movies is the way in which characters and the plot are balanced - so that you really feel for the heroes on an intimate level, while never abandoning the continuous course of history.Visual effects are obviously crucial to the movie's success, and here they used brilliantly. Unlike most blockbusters, which routinely follow formulas that involve a load of explosions and similar eye-candy, to Weta's credit (and to the credit of VFX in general) Rise of the Planet of the Apes uses them to provide a unique medium - one that replaces humans with apes, and, ridiculous as it will sound to someone new to the concept, it works really, really well. Since 2011, mo-cap has improved noticeably, and supposedly it will continue to do so. Still, visually it is very pleasing, and story-wise it excels. I think animation is a praise-worthy mode of story- telling, and the method by which it is here blended so it meshes perfectly with live-action is a joy to behold.When Rise of the Planet of the Apes hit cinemas in 2011, nobody was expecting the successful reboot that followed, and though it received strong critical reviews, audiences never showed the support I believe it deserved. Over the years, it has risen in true-ape style to enter the highest ranks of my all-time favourite films. The serious pitch and good continuity are maintained as the trilogy progresses. It has many great moments; I can hardly recommend it enough. If you have yet to see this movie, don't waste any more time - see it right away!

An iconic series is brought into the 21st century with engaging results. Starting from square one, it shows how a dedicated researcher, Will Rodman (James Franco), is desperate to create a cure for Alzheimers', which is afflicting his father (ever solid John Lithgow). He is experimenting on chimpanzees, and the ultimate result is a super intelligent chimp whom he names Caesar (motion capture expert Andy Serkis). Caesar ends up in an animal shelter where he is treated terribly by a sadistic employee (Tom Felton of the "Harry Potter" series). He ends up so disillusioned with the human race that he motivates his fellow primates to stage an uprising.For quite a while, "Rise of the Planet of the Apes" is so emotionally involving, and riveting, that it really keeps you watching. You genuinely sympathize with a lot of the characters, and also naturally come to hate characters such as a stereotypically greedy corporation bigwig (David Oyelowo), the nasty Dodge (Felton), and the hostile neighbor Hunsiker (David Hewlett). The apes may be digitally rendered in what is now standard practice, but thanks to the human actors helping to bring them to life, you can see a definite depth of emotion in their eyes and expressions. Serkis has certainly become an absolute master at this brand of performing.The film does go a little heavy on the effects, and may strike some people as being pretty manipulative. Still, there's no denying its potency, which does help to make up for any drawbacks, such as the over the top, utterly conventional action climax.Franco does a decent job in the lead, but Freida Pinto is given little to do as his love interest. Lithgow does an excellent job, as could be expected. Overall, the human cast does creditable work: Brian Cox, Tyler Labine, Jamie Harris, Ty Olsson, etc.What will be fun for veteran fans of this series will be the little nods to previous movies along the way, including THAT legendary line of dialogue from Charlton Heston.Seven out of 10.