Rise of the Planet of the Apes

As both a simian simile and a wonder of technology, Rise of the Planet of the Apes deserves to be in the company of the great original "Kong." This year's sixth "origins" story of a fantasy franchise (after The Green Hornet, Thor, X-Men: First Class, Green Lantern and Captain America: The First Avenger) is also the year's finest action movie.

By far the best spectacle movie of the season, and one of the few films to use digital technology for nuanced dramatic effect.

The cautionary tale feels surprisingly fresh and entertaining, given that this is the fifth "Planet of the Apes" film since the 1968 original.

The movie has its pleasures, although human intelligence is not one of them. Caesar, to begin with, is a wonderfully executed character, a product of special effects and a motion-capture performance by Andy Serkis, who earlier gave us Gollum in "Lord of the Rings."

The movie is zippier than Tim Burton's oddly lifeless 2001 "Planet of the Apes" remake, but unlike good sci-fi, it doesn't signify anything, or really even try to.

It is not what could be fairly called a bad movie, but neither is it fine enough to be a good one, with its lineup of dull characters and a limp story that functions like a conveyor belt.

Hell, even Heston's performance elicited cheers back in the day. Franco, in a totally, tonally different role, but still the prime human here, is a pale shadow of the ruined future to come.

[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]

Now THIS... is a reboot. EXCITING - CREATIVE - PROVOCATIVE - COOL I'm a huge fan of preqeuels, so this one definitely got me. The concept pulls you in, but the characters are what you stay for. Suddenly, you'll find yourself caring so much about and even identifying with a CGI ape... but that's what film is about, right? The premise presents some thought-provoking questions about humanity, which is the whole purpose. The original series had plenty of these moments, and Rise folds in all of the same questions. A film becomes powerful when it makes you start thinking. Though not without its own flaws, Rise is a great establishment of the rebooted series, laying the groundwork for Dawn, which is where they always should have gone with the story...

Uncanny valley apes become hugely intelligent overnight from breathing the smart gas. The smart ape is raised until adulthood by humans in a loving environment but after meeting a bad human concludes that all humans must be bad. The huge war between ape and man is 100 apes versus 30 police on the golden gate bridge. Lots of telegraphing in a predictable plot that leaves few surprises. CGI is ok for the time, but not great. Forgettable leads.

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Rise of the planet of the apes is a poor excuse for a film. As far as trying to give us an origin story to the planet of the apes franchise it does achieve this though it is completely unrealistic and even comical. The first half of the film has storyline and attempts to make the film seem acceptable, the second half is just a pure failure that only achieves to show off the CGI which is of a below average quality anyway.