Yesterday, I took my brother to the movies, something I enjoy doing on Friday when new movies come out. The movie he wanted to see: Rise of the Planet of the Apes.
Now, going into this, my expectations were honestly not that high. I was not the biggest fan of Planet of the Apes for some reason so I thought this would be the same thing.
I was wrong. This movie was GREAT and I enjoyed it quite a bit.
The story revolves around two characters: Dr. Will Rodman (James Franco) and the chimp Caesar (Andy Serkis). Rodman created what he thought to be a cure for Alzheimer’s and it does not go through because the chimp that was the test subject goes crazy. Before that, the chimp showed an increase in IQ tenfold. Well, the chimp had a child (Caesar) who inherited the skills his mother had. Seeing as how the skills work, he gives the serum to his father (John Lithgow). Dr. Rodman even finds a girl (Freida Pinto) and the two of them raise Caesar together.
Serkis truly has a skill for playing motion-capture characters. The whole time, I thought that they used real apes! This was what made me famous, as he played Gollum in The Lord of the Rings trilogy, and he won awards for that role. He also played King Kong in the movie King Kong. His body mimicing of an actual chimp is flawless.
The storyline, also, was better than I expected. The story of the father, and watching his struggle as he deals with Alzheimer’s, is very moving. As you see how bad he is, and then as he gets better with the medicine, you feel for him and smile along with him. But then as he gets worse, you feel for him and struggle along with Rodman as he tries to take care of him.
The only problem, I see, is the fact that I have a feeling, despite the great quality of the movie, it will get lost in the shuffle of all of the summer blockbusters, like HP, Transformers, and Captain America. It is a great movie, but does not have any qualities that will make it one for the history books.
In the end, I definitely recommend going to see it. The critics loved it, I enjoyed it, etc. I give it a 3 out of 4 and my bro gives it a 3.5 out of 4. If you like a movie with a moving story, its fair share of action, and great acting, this is for you.
