Rise of the Planet of the Apes

“Rise of the Planet of the Apes,” released in 2011, is a title suggesting that it needs a sequel, because in this film, it ends with the chimpanzees only going as far as crossing the Golden Gate Bridge: Today San Francisco, tomorrow the world. It comes up with the idea that chimps, who we thought was a few genes from humans, only need a brand new drug to be good at a game of chess.

The film starts at a drug company, where Will Rodman, played by James Franco, is a scientist who invented the ALZ 112, which could possibly cure Alzheimer’s. He experiments on it with the chimpanzees, which suddenly have a high IQ shot and are able to do sign-language.

However, one of the test chimps goes crazy and attacks a board meeting, which calls the experiment off. You would think that scientists should have the same knowledge that we all do, which is that chimps are kind animals until they hit their growing age, which is when they develop the characteristics of a wild animal. Guessing that the ALZ 112 works Will believes that it would be alright to test it on his dad without thinking of the risk that he will beat people with his walker.

Will feels elated by the difficulty of a helpless baby chimp that he decides to take it home with him “for a few days.” That turns into years, and Caesar is able to gain a vast amount of intelligence and, as Ebert puts it, “the body language of a Marcel Marceau.” Around the same time, Will becomes infatuated with a primatologist named Caroline, played by Freida Pinto, who arrives in and plays Caesar’s surrogate mother. If she becomes a surrogate wife to Will is a good question, since this movie only gives what a PG-13 movie can about friendly details. When she kisses him after a few years into the relationship, it gives us the belief that she finally has made her statement. Ebert even claimed in his review, “I expected her to be employed as a device for getting lots of info about chimps into the dialogue, but no, she doesn't know much more than anyone else.”

Ebert also sated in his review, “By a benign coincidence, the fascinating documentary "Project Nim" has been playing around the country and provides a sort of briefing for this film.” It has a more interesting relationship between men and women, and apes and humans. It tells us that chimps may be intelligent and friendly, but they are not humans, and when they grow, they turn vicious. The chimp experts are seen running across the Golden Gate Bridge crying out, “Caesar! Caesar!” long after they have found out that Caesar moved his last pawn to K4.

Now with that stated, the movie has its interests, although human intelligence isn’t one of them. To start off, Caesar is a perfectly executed character, a product of special effects and a motion-capture performance by Andy Serkis, who before dazzled everyone as Smeagol from “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy (and returns in “The Hobbit” trilogy). No one knows exactly where the human ends and the effects begin, but Serkis and/or Caesar are the best performances in the movie.

James Franco struggles with an underwritten role that is taken away from philosophical and ethical questions and limits itself to plot points in basic English. Ebert described Freida Pinto’s Caroline as “no Dian Fossey, and indeed gives no hints that she has even heard of her, but, man, is she gorgeous.” Tom Felton, who you will remember as Malfoy from the “Harry Potter” series, plays a keeper in the monkey building who is a complete jerk to apes on purpose, which is unlikely but does serve a reason. People who make faces at chimpanzees give the guests more about themselves than they should share. Finally, John Lithgow is in here as Will’s dad, who was once a respected music teacher, now suffering from Alzheimer’s. He is in the film to perform the way he usually does and not anything more.

Ebert said in his review: “There's a big climactic action scene that is more engaging than the countless similar scenes I've seen with zombies. And a conclusion that is uplifting and inspiring for the apes, I assume, and proves that Caesar is so smart that when he sees a place from another place, he knows how to find his way back to the other place from the first one, which is what humans need GPS for.”

Final verdict: this is the movie you have been waiting more. No more, no less.

Well, that concludes my “Planet of the Apes week.” Stay tuned sometime later in the month when I review the latest in the series. Now I just have to find a day when I can go to the theater to check it out.