Sometimes when they announce prequels to a much loved film, they are met with groans from the loving public. Especially when that film was once a series of movies that inspired a rehashed and dull remake. That series was the Planet of the Apes. In 2011, however, director Rupert Wyatt presented us with a phenomenal start to a war saga that will see the development of the ape-infested Earth. Following on from that epic slice of background, and continuing with our smarter-than-the-average-chimp Caesar as he leads a pack of developed primates in a world desolate of humans. The new film Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, this time directed by Cloverfield’s Matt Reeves is the summer blockbuster to, ha ha, rise. Luckily for this journalist, and a handful of others, we were treated to a sneak peak look at the brand new movie. And they aren’t monkeying around.
“The lights have gone down around the world and there is this pocket of survivors,” Serkis says, taking us through the story. It goes as such, the Simian Virus has wiped out most of humanity. A pocket of survivors live in the cities of San Francisco, trying to get by. When they stumble into the territory of the apes, a fear is sparked between both sects of animals. On one side, humanity, led by the terrified and angered Dreyfus. The other side, the apes, who have an enhanced community of communication and family, with Caesar at the helm. As fear and intrusion threaten war between both species, Caesar must find a way to encourage harmony. Not just with the humans, but with his own.
The barrage of clips shown here do exactly what they have intended, they have enticed us into a frenzy. Trying not to give everything away, but Reeves has created something completely special here. Bringing a realism to the tale and feeling as though this could be five years down the line, Reeves hasn’t wavered from the pulsating characters at the core. Including Caesar and Maurice from the first film, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes adds enticing new ones. There is Caesar’s son Bright Eyes, a passionate father Rocket, and a violent monkey Koba, who was abused in laboratories. On the human side is a human family brought together by the tragedy and a man named Malcolm who wants peace, too. With an almost mirror image against the ape, the blockbuster is tantalising already.
It is an incredible set-up and makes the movie one of the more interesting blockbusters. The technology is outstanding. Taking a lot of work, even some of these clips weren’t finished as there were 7,000 frames to enhance with enormous detail. Studio WETA are, in short, master craftsmen. They not only make the primates layered with realism, but they give them emotions and, with the help of actors, character. There is no “dead behind the eyes” effects, it looks as though they found these hyper-intelligent monkeys to perform. It is astonishing, long gone are the days of plastic masks. Though there are 15 actors playing important ape roles, there were 2000 in shot. Reeves wanted to use as much motion-capture as possible and littered the background with performance artists and actors. The most intriguing of the actors is Toby Kebbell. Poised to literally take over the film industry, he plays Koba, a monkey opposed to humanity because of their brutality and in an Easter Egg clip, you see just how enraged he is.
The movie looks brilliant and the effects are impeccable. Head over to your cinemas this summer for a battle of psychology, sociology and species. And if that doesn’t work, let’s just hear from not only Serkis, but the two experts joining him: Evolutionary psychologist Carole Jahme and Professor of Primatology at the University College London Volker Sommer.
And go ape for Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.