When trying to figure out what to do this week, I went back and forth on where exactly to land. I felt like this was a good time to do a list of The Planet of the Ape movies… well, the new one’s at least so I can get ready for the newest one coming out in two weeks. But, since I really hold all three of these movies in a similar spot and it would be hard to rank them, so then it came to me, what a great time to do another Mindless Movie Marathon, in fact, I could make it a Mindless Monkey Movie Marathon. Sure, I know they are called apes, but that doesn’t sound as neat in my title now does it? So, in honor of The Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes coming out soon, let’s get to this marathon.
Rise of the Planet of the Apes
To start us off, we are going to re-visit “Rise of the Planet of the Apes”. This quite literal is a setup movie. Nothing major happens with the downfall of the human race, but the story focus’ mainly on Will Rodman (played by James Franco) and his job of trying to find a cure for Alzheimer’s Disease. His dad (John Lithgow) is suffering from it and he uses him as a catalyst. Both Franco and Lithgow do a fine job of portraying the Rodman men here, but the real star here is of course Caesar. Caesar is played by Andy Serkis and absolutely shines in this role across all three of these films. The work they do to capture his expressions and bring them to life on an ape is nothing short of phenomenal.
Will brings Caesar home as a baby so he doesn’t get “put down” by the lab where he works. Since his mother was injected with the test drug for the Alzheimer’s cure, Caesar was born with it in his veins. As he grows older, he shows incredible signs of intelligence and learning capabilities. After an incident puts him in an ape facility, he breaks out, steals more of the virus and “infects” the other apes also being held captive. Eventually, they all break out, storm the city, and flee to the forest to be free.
While this is going on, one of Will’s co-workers (Tyler Labine) catches the flu that makes the apes smarter, but unfortunately it is deadly to humans. Backed by a good cast (including Brian Cox, Tom Felton, and Freida Pinto) the main stars push this origin story to a climatic finish as the apes try to gain their freedom. But by far, the biggest thing to happen might be during the closing credits. We can see the spread of the virus across the world in the background as the credits roll. This sets up the next movie almost as much as the character of Caesar himself is being setup to be a hero again and again.
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
Next on our list is “The Dawn of the Planet of the Apes”. This takes place a few years (10 to be exact) after “Rise” and features the great Andy Serkis reviving his role as Caesar the ape who is now in charge of all the apes in the area. A few of the apes from the first movie also return, including Koba (Toby Kebbell). The apes have now built a thriving community, but all that changes when a group of humans show up looking to gain access to the waterfall so they can use it as power for the part of San Fransico that they have been living.
Reluctant at first after one of the humans kill an ape, Caesar eventually agrees to let them do their work and some of the apes even chip in to assist them. This doesn’t sit well with Koba and a few of the other apes who start to grow suspicious of the humans and their intentions. After a couple of them do some investigation and find that the humans have a huge supply of weapons, Koba sets out a plan to shoot Caesar and blame the humans. This eventually leads to an all-out attack as the apes storm the humans home destroying it and killing a bunch of them. A group of the humans led by Malcolm (Jason Clarke), find Caesar and help him. Once they reunite him with his son, some of the humans and apes try to work together to take down Koba and stop an all out war from happening.
This one feels like more of a Planet of the Apes movie. The apes have already evolved and are highly intelligent. There are only a small number of humans left since only 1 out of every 500 survived the flu. Lots of great real-life humans play some pivotal roles in this one too. Gary Oldman as Dreyfus, Keri Russell as Ellie, and Kodi Smit-McPhee as Alexander. This doesn’t exactly end in a cliffhanger, but sets us up for something potentially bigger moving forward.
War for the Planet of the Apes
Speaking of something bigger, how about an out-right war now? Two years have passed since “Dawn” and the apes and humans are in the middle of an on-going war. Caesar (once again played by Andy Serkis) makes the decision to leave and find a new home elsewhere, but they can’t go anywhere until they know it’s safe. The human army is led by a man known as The Colonel (Woody Harrelson) and he is know to be ruthless, unstoppable, and perhaps a little mad. After they are betrayed and his wife and older son killed, Caesar and his band of familiar followers Maurice, Rocket, and Luca go on mission to track down the military base.
This one also had the feel of a true Planet of the Apes movie meaning the apes are continuing to evolve and get smarter. More of them are able to talk, like Bad Ape, who they meet on the way and he ends up assisting them throughout the film. Most humans also have a biased hate towards the apes even though most of them don’t even know why they are fighting, just blindly following The Colonel. The big plot point of this one other than Caesar’s revenge and his eventual heroism to free the captive apes is The Colonel and his inability to stop the spread of the virus. He succumbs to it at the end as Caesar and most of the other apes that survived the attack escape. An avalanche covers the entire army base and all incoming forces leaving only the apes as survivors.
We obviously don’t know exact plot points of “Kingdom” yet, but this appears to be a natural end for this trilogy as Caesar finally dies from the wounds of the battle. Just as he and Maurice sit down in what will become their new home, they talk for a minute and then he is gone.
I like all three of these movies about the same, it would be hard to rank them based on that alone. They all bring something different to the experience and move the story along in a different way.
Did you enjoy the Mindless Monkey Movie Marathon? How would you rank them if you tried? Are you ready for The Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes”? I hope everyone has a great week and join me here next week for a new movie review.
