Reviews

The themes of human extinction and doomsday have been done to death in Hollywood. We have had alien attacks in Independence Day, asteroid collisions in Armageddon, machines taking over the world in The Terminator, The Matrix and The Transformers, global climatic catastrophes in The Day after Tomorrow and 2012, and pandemics leading to the wipe-out of the human race in I am Legend and Resident Evil. But these panic inducing themes have always managed to garner an audience thanks to the overwhelming special effects showing destruction, edge-of- the-seat action, and the sheer daredevilry of the characters involved. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes lends a new perspective to this theme. While it shows the perennial undying human spirit for survival and their utter disregard for any other living species in the pursuit of it, it tries to zoom in closer on the conscientious aspect of the human mind. The intellectually advanced apes have also been portrayed in the same light as their human counterparts. Although the transition from the last installation is not entirely seamless, the script is far more rational compared to 2001's Planet of the Apes which had a sophisticated and highly evolved ape colony enslaving humans. This one has a start similar to I am Legend wherein the human race has been eliminated due to a simian flu triggered by a scientifically developed virus. As expected, a handful of American survivors immune to the virus colonize a small area of San Fransico trying to make the most out of the limited resources available to them. Concurrently, they attempt to establish contact with any potential survivors elsewhere. Gary Oldman plays Dreyfus, a former military man who leads the settlement. Soon they are close to running out of their power backups and the solution to this problem lies in the forest across the Golden Gate Bridge where Caesar and his extended family of apes have built a protectorate of their own. The latter part of the story then revolves around the negotiation and conflict between the ape colony and the group of humans who are trying to bring back the old power source to life. This group of humans is lead by Malcolm (Jason Clarke) and Ellie (Keri Russell) though Keri Russell's role comes forth only as a filler for a female lead. Instead of sensationalizing the plot, director Matt Reeves manages to keep it grounded by delving deeper into the humane aspect of the face-off. At the risk of making it look preachy, he tries to show how a future struggle of survival might be more about introspection rather than brawn. Caesar played by Andy Serkis continues to address the whole situation with a rationality which is completely unexpected of an ape no matter how evolved it is. While he has to put up with the rebellious Kobo, Malcolm has a rotten apple of his own to deal with. The movie is successful in driving home its message of the co-existence of good and bad elements in civilization where the good needs to continue to pursue its cause irrespective of the action of the bad (I can only wonder what George R. R. Martin would have thought about that). And it does this without compromising on the entertainment quotient. Andy Serkis does justice to Caesar's character yet again just as he did to Gollum and King Kong. The movie ends with an implicit hint at a sequel but that can only be confirmed by the franchise.