- Directed by: Rupert Wyatt
- Written by: Rick Jaffa, Amanda Silver, Pierre Boulle
- Stars: James Franco, Andy Serkis, Freida Pinto, John Lithgow
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 45 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1yKN0llkrY
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
This was a reimagining and prequel to the 1968 original Planet of the Apes that tells us how the apes got smart and how the human population got greatly reduced. Instead of humans in ape makeup this time around, they used humans doing motion capture overlaid CGI, and it works really well. It’s more of a science fiction action adventure kind of movie than horror, and it’s very entertaining.
Spoilery Synopsis
We open on a bunch of apes in the deep forest. It all gets very quiet, and then the apes are chased by humans; many apes are captured in nets, packed in boxes, and shipped overseas for medical experimentation.
Robert Franklin and Will Rodman watch as “Bright Eyes,” a really intelligent ape, solves a problem in record time. Steven, Will’s boss, says he’ll talk to the board about moving ahead with their project. ALZ-112 is a new gene therapy that is being developed as a cure for Alzheimer’s Disease.
Bright Eyes, however, is a wild animal and is very aggressive. She escapes and runs rampant through the whole facility, even the board room, where she’s shot dead by the security guards. Steven then orders Robert to put all the apes down; the program has been cancelled.
Robert figures out that Bright Eyes was pregnant, which is why she went berserk. He refuses to kill the baby and gives him to William. William can’t do it either, and ends up taking the baby home with him.
Charles Rodman is Will’s father, and he’s suffering from Alzheimer’s. Charles and the baby, whom he names Caesar, get very attached, very quickly. The baby is unusually smart. Over the next three years, Caesar gets a lot smarter, and Will continues to study him. Charles, on the other hand, just gets worse and worse.
At work, Will steals some of the ALZ-112 and takes it home. He gives it to Charles, and it works very quickly, restoring the dementia-riddled old man to his former self, overnight.
With all the excitement, Caesar goes outside to play with the kids out there. That goes badly, and Caesar gets hurt. Will takes him to the zoo to see the vet there, and the other apes get really quiet when Caesar passes them. The vet is Caroline, and she starts dating Will.
Will, Charles, and Caroline take Caesar out to Muir Woods National Forest, where the redwoods are. Five years later, he still enjoys coming to the forest to climb and play; he’s much bigger now. Caesar resents being a “pet,” but Will calls himself Caesar’s father.
Will takes Caesar to the lab and explains what chimpanzees are and why Caesar’s so smart. This is the first time Caroline has heard all this, so she needs a more detailed explanation. Caesar is starting to get really moody, and Charles isn’t as cured as he used to be; the dementia is coming back.
Charles gets worse very quickly. At one point, he wanders off and steals the neighbor’s car, wrecking it. The neighbor screams at Charles, upsetting him, and this also upsets Caesar, who rushes out to protect his grandfather. This is going to be trouble.
Animal Control comes to take away the crazy chimp. Caroline and Will go along, and the place doesn’t look too bad, like a big playground. John Landon, the man who runs the place, has seen this before with former pets.
Caesar soon learns that he’s in monkey jail, and he’s very sad, as are Will, Charles, and Caroline. As soon as they leave, John puts Caesar into a much less friendly-ooking cage. John’s son, Dodge, is mean to the apes in his custody. Meanwhile, Caesar sees all the many other apes in the place.
Charles continues to get worse, so Will decides to make a newer, stronger drug. Steven still believes the drug is dangerous, and Will tells him everything about Charles. He believes that Charles not only got better, he got smarter than he ever was; he improved. Steven agrees to resume animal testing, and more apes are ordered.
Will meets a whole new cohort of apes, including a scarred one named Koba. Instead of an injection, ALZ-113, the new drug, is spread by aerosol gas. In one experiment, Richard gets exposed to the gas by accident.
Meanwhile, Caesar continues to be abused by Dodge. He eventually gets put into a big cage with all the other apes, including an orangutan and a very large gorilla. The other chimps sense something wrong with Caesar and attack him, but he’s way smarter than they are.
Steven sees that Koba can read and write now. He’s really smart. Richard is feeling pretty awful, he’s sneezing blood.
Back in ape-jail, Caesar uses sign language to talk to Maurice, the orangutan. He sees the Gen-Sys order, and he knows that name. Will comes for a visit, and Caesar really wants to go home with him, but that’s not going to happen.
Caesar manages to build a lockpick and release Buck, the big gorilla. Buck has never been out of his cage before, so Caesar’s got a new ally. While free, Caesar establishes dominance over the alpha ape.
Will administers a euthanasia drug to Charles, and in the morning, he’s dead. Steven is super impressed with Koba, but the virus they use to administer the drug is potentially dangerous. Will wonders about Franklin, who hasn’t come to work in several days. Franklin goes to Will’s house and sneezes all over the obnoxious neighbor.
Will bribes John and Dodge to release Caesar, but Caesar would prefer to stay with his new friends. The other apes approve of Caesar’s choice.
Caesar lets himself out one night and goes home to Will’s place. He sees the ALZ-113 drug in the fridge and steals it. He takes it back to the other apes and releases the gas for all of them.
In the morning, all the apes have changed, which is not lost on John and Dodge. Caesar starts teaching them all sign language.
Dodge continues to abuse Caesar, who finally yells, “No!” He beats up Dodge and releases all his compatriots. Caesar kills Dodge, sort of accidentally. Then they all escape out to the countryside.
Back at the lab, the alzheimer’s drug goes into mass production. At home, Franklin’s landlord finds him in bed, dead. Will finds out about the apes’ escape and knows where they’re headed.
The apes storm the Gen-Sys lab and free the apes there, including Koba. Steven learns about what happened to Franklin, but it’s too late. The apes then invade the zoo and free the apes there as well. They rampage through the city, and the police get involved. Soon, the apes are armed. The big apes, Maurica and Buck, are especially useful.
The whole group of apes crosses the Golden Gate Bridge, trying to get to the forest. There are a million armed cops on the far end of the bridge setting up an ambush. The apes go over and under the bridge, avoiding the police. Some of the apes fight, but Caesar tries to minimize the casualties on both sides.
The apes soon overpower the police on the bridge. The police helicopter shows up with a machine gun, and it starts looking pretty bleak for the apes. Buck knocks Caesar out of the path of some bullets, leaps into the copter, and causes it to crash. Caesar takes care of Buck for the minute or so before he dies, the big hero of the battle.
Koba then pushes the wreckage of the copter over the side of the bridge, along with Steven. He’s not as nice as Caesar. Will grabs one of the police cars and chases the apes out to the redwood forest.
Koba threatens Will, but Caesar intervenes. Will apologizes for his part in all this and wants Caesar to come home with him. “Caesar is home,” says the ape. Caesar, Maurice, Rocket, Koba, and the others climb the redwoods, happy and free.
Meanwhile, Will’s annoying neighbor, who is a pilot, spread the ALZ-112 plague across the rest of the world…
Brian’s Commentary
The CGI here is still better than most modern films; the apes are exceptionally expressive, each with their own personalities. As different as this version is from what came before, there are lots of callbacks to the earlier films, especially the original.
There are a few hundred apes at this point, and it seems likely they’d soon be rounded up, if not for that pesky plague distracting everyone.
It’s mostly logical, and it explains a lot that the original didn’t. It’s quite good!
Kevin’s Commentary
This one grew on me more this second viewing. I saw the original Planet of the Apes movies at the theater when they came out and later again on television, so I’m biased toward the originals out of nostalgia. But the motion capture and other CGI in this holds up really well, and it’s very entertaining. I’d recommend it.