Rise of the Planet of the Apes is better than any cynical reboot has any right to be. Director Rupert Wyatt’s (The Escapist) work shows both style and an assured sense of direction that’s impressive for a first time big-budget filmmaker.
The movie follows the work of biologist Will Rodman (James Franco, The Broken Tower), a researcher developing a cure for Alzheimer’s. As part of the project, Rodman tests potential treatments on chimpanzees before a cataclysmic accident scuttles the project.
Rodman manages to save a baby chimp, whom he names Caesar (performed via motion capture by Andy Serkis, Accused). Said chimp grows into a hyper-intelligent being who gets court-ordered into an animal sanctuary after going bananas on Rodman’s aggressive neighbor.
There, Caesar suffers cruelty and injustice at the hands of sadistic caretakers (Brian Cox, The Veteran and Tom Felton of Harry Potter fame). He pouts and thinks a bit before deciding to lead a primate prison-break that escalates into a takeover of San Francisco.
The story flies all over the place, clumsily moving from bio-horror to prison-escape to human drama to war film. All of the blame lies on the abominable screenplay written by Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver.
Their script trades actual characterization for broad stereotype and dull banter. The written dialogue is lifeless and insipid, with Rodman’s presentation to a group of bioscience investors being particularly cringeworthy.
Working from a lackluster script, Wyatt and crew manage to both elevate and transcend the material and the campy original films. Rise is perhaps the best film that could have been made with that lousy screenplay and it’s easily the best entry in the Planet of the Apes series.
Okay, okay, so that’s with a few caveats and qualifications. The film shoehorns in a couple of immensely awkward Planet of the Apes references. For the uninitiated, these little winks won’t be noticed. For anyone with even the most rudimentary understanding of the series, these little showstoppers may cause excessive cringing.
The performances from the lead humans are pretty bad. Franco stumbles from scene to scene with the air of a heavily intoxicated and indifferent performer while Freida Pinto (as Rodman’s lady friend) reminds audiences why she hasn’t been in a successful movie since Slumdog Millionaire.
The supporting cast is better, with Felton providing a surprisingly good performance outside of his Draco Malfoy range and John Lithgow (How I Met Your Mother) as Rodman’s Alzherimer’s-suffering dad providing some much needed pathos to the human tale. Yet, for all of the extra gravitas added by the side cast, the human characters are all far too ancillary and underwritten in the script to be compelling.
Credit must be given to Wyatt and his editing team for sidelining the underwhelming human tale in favor of the titular rise of the apes. Once Caesar and his merry gang of primates take over the show, the movie actually has some decent emotional heft.
The actual story conveyed in the second half of Rise isn’t anything particularly new or even compelling. It’s like Che meets 28 Weeks Later. Yet, the novelty of seeing chimps, instead of communists or zombies, throw down humanity is refreshing and even compelling. All of this, of course, is aided by some tremendous motion capture performances.
The motion capture crew at WETA deserves huge credit. Never before have the facial animations and, even, eyes of the performers been translated so well and so thoroughly as they have in Rise.
Serkis, an experienced motion actor, delivers by far his best performance. Caesar’s eyes are capable of projecting warmth, sadness and emotion better than any other CGI creation to date — he’s easily the most compelling character in the whole film. He just exudes pathos and charisma.
It’s a bit of a letdown, then, that the other VFX work is so unpolished. For all of the convincing facial work on the apes, the actual combination of the facial model and the hairy ape-body model is never quite convincing.
The final action set piece, filmed and breathlessly cut along a foggy section of the Golden Gate Bridge, contains some of the worst CGI in any blockbuster this summer. Other computer effects (especially explosions) appear flat and unconvincing, a shame considering how well the film is paced and framed.
But even with these flaws, Rise of the Planet of the Apes is easily the best installment in the venerated yet campy B-movie sci-fi series and a rare great summer blockbuster. When it hits its stride, Rise tugs at your heartstrings while pumping up your heart rate. Good stuff indeed.
RATING: 3 out of 5 stars
chzhang@umdbk.com
