 ***PLEASE NOTE: A Blu-ray 3D disc is only compatible with 3D Blu-ray players.*** Tagline: For freedom. For family. For the planet. In War for the Planet of the Apes, the third chapter of the critically acclaimed blockbuster franchise, Caesar and his apes are forced into a deadly conflict with an army of humans led by a ruthless Colonel. This epic of interspecies war pits the apes led by Caesar against a deadly human army. After catastrophic losses, Caesar reluctantly adapts ruthless tactics to assure his clan's survival. Storyline: Caesar and his apes are forced into a deadly conflict with an army of humans led by a ruthless Colonel. After the apes suffer unimaginable losses, Caesar wrestles with his darker instincts and begins his own mythic quest to avenge his kind. As the journey finally brings them face to face, Caesar and the Colonel are pitted against each other in an epic battle that will determine the fate of both their species and the future of the planet. Written by Twentieth Century Fox Reviewer's Note: Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman, October 24, 2017 There's a somewhat opaque meme of sorts being shared on some social media platforms that looks like a random set of numbers, but which turns out to be the posters' personal rankings of the various Star Wars: The Complete Saga films. I have yet to see a similar undertaking for the Planet of the Apes: Legacy Collection, something that may indicate the perhaps subliminally held general opinion that none of the sequels to the original 1968 Planet of the Apes really completely lived up to the potential of the first film, whatever their individual strengths may have been. The first film appealed to my little boy consciousness enough that I actually went out and found a paperback copy of Pierre Boulle's source novel (who woulda thunk that the same scribe who gave us The Bridge on the River Kwai also wrote this?), which in some ways is manifestly different from Rod Serling's adaptive screenplay for the first film, even if the central premise of "smart apes" and "dumb humans" was left largely intact. The novel ends with a somewhat predictable twist involving a framing conceit, but that first film had one of the (then) more unexpected endings for a major science fiction film, one which contained what is still one of the most iconic images from that era of cinema. That very ending would have seemed to suggest that the original Planet of the Apes "should" have been a one off, but when box office receipts pour in as massively as they did upon the release of that film, it usually doesn't take studio bean counters very long to start wondering how much more lucre is out there waiting to be deposited in their accounts. The first film gave birth to no fewer than four sequels, Beneath the Planet of the Apes, Escape From the Planet of the Apes, Conquest of the Planet of the Apes and Battle for the Planet of the Apes, and while there are certainly some fairly interesting ideas running through the follow ups, my sense is not too many fans would disagree all that strongly with the contention that there was definitely a law of diminishing returns with the franchise as it went on. It's perhaps all the more notable, then, that the "reboot" series, which began with Rise of the Planet of the Apes and continued with Dawn of the Planet of the Apes has arguably only gotten better as it has gone along (for the purposes of this review, we'll just handily skip right over Tim Burton's Planet of the Apes, which I actually kinda sorta liked, at least more than a lot of other people with whom I've discussed the film). According to several online articles, co-writers Matt Reeves (who also directed) and Mark Bomback cite any number of previous cinematic referents that helped shape War for the Planet of the Apes' novelistic screenplay. Interestingly, the film adaptation of Boulle's The Bridge on the River Kwai was among them, specifically with regard to the film's depiction of the relationship between Caesar (Andy Serkis, via motion capture) and this film's main human antagonist, The Colonel (Woody Harrelson), a relationship which supposedly echoes the one between the characters played by Alec Guinness and Sessue Hayakawa in the David Lean classic. But in researching the background for this review, I was actually not surprised to see a couple of other, ostensibly more "weird" seeming, influences mentioned, including The Ten Commandments, since in a very real way Caesar's "journey" in this film, both literally and figuratively, seems to have certain Mosaic (as in Moses) tendencies. One of the more obvious referents, in this case non-ape, comes courtesy of the character of The Colonel, who seems to be unabashedly modeled on Colonel Kurtz (down to his rank, of course) from Apocalypse Now. Even some of the visual presentations of the character seem to mimic choices Brando and Coppola made for their film, and there's no denying the similarity in a remote outpost offering a paranoiac leader in charge of a large cult (in this particular case one which includes both humans and simians who are "donkeys", i.e., slaves of a sort who act as aides to the humans). The unexpectedly moving narrative of this film is in essence a long setup aching to deliver the inevitable final showdown between Caesar and The Colonel, which of course occurs, but not until a series of often fascinating character motivations are revealed. Caesar, as is his wont, seems to prefer peace in the forest with his simian kin, but due to the vagaries of fate, he finds himself thrust into warrior status, perhaps against his will. But even this element is nicely shaded, as Caesar is in fact on a mission of vengeance for reasons which won't be spoiled in this review. The entire evolution (no pun intended) of Caesar's already fairly complex character is one of War for the Planet of the Apes' most accomplished achievements and is brought vividly to life by Andy Serkis' performance, which is a marvel of motion capture elegance combined with CGI near perfection. There are a number of really interesting sidebars in this feature which may in fact not be that germane to the overall thrust of the narrative, but which neatly refer to Apes canon while perhaps setting the stage for a fourth film. One of these elements deals with humans who are increasingly unable to speak, including a little girl named (speaking of canon) Nova (Amiah Miller), who ends up accompanying Caesar and his crew on their quest, a nurturing aspect to the apes which ironically probably tends to "humanize" them. There are also obvious visual referents to some of the previous (original) films, including a nice twist on the migrants on horseback at the beach scene which capped the first film. In my estimation, about the only thing that slightly hobbles this effort is its arguable over length. At almost two and a half hours, War for the Planet of the Apes certainly takes advantage of its sprawling narrative and epic visual ambitions, but it seems padded at times, especially in the last hour or so, where skirmishes keep recurring without any real forward momentum. That's a small price to pay, however, for a film which delivers as much raw emotional power as this film manages to do. If a social media ranking meme of these "new" Planet of the Apes movies ever becomes a thing, my hunch is a lot of fans are going to have a very hard time deciding on which one is best. What was the last franchise you can name where the sequels arguably just kept getting better? I doubt even fans of Star Wars would suggest that that franchise was a straight up climb in quality each time. But these new Planet of the Apes films have been a wonder both technically and perhaps even more amazingly from a story and character perspective, and those aspects are once again stunningly on display throughout War for the Planet of the Apes. A little judicious trimming might have made this an unabashed 5.0 for me personally, but even at a bit too long the film has enduring emotional resonance and is a new benchmark for motion capture and general VFX excellence. Technical merits are first rate even if the 3D rarely rises to consistently spectacular levels, the supplementary package enjoyable, and War for the Planet of the Apes 3D comes Highly recommended. [CSW] -3.1- I agree with this reviewer: As the third installment in a prequel series, War for the Planet of the Apes does a great job of bridging the gap with the 1968 version. However, so much of what we see in this film (fighting, guns, and bombs) has already been fleshed out repeatedly in the first two films. I had hoped to see these apes in a more "developed" setting comparable to the older versions. This didn't strike me at all like a "fresh" film, and I found it to be an exhausting end to an exhausting franchise. Seeing it in 3D did add some to this film but not enough to make it a stand out. [V5.0-A5.0] MPEG-4 AVC - D-Box was a little over the top some of the time. Cast Notes: Andy Serkis (Caesar), Woody Harrelson (The Colonel), Steve Zahn (Bad Ape), Karin Konoval (Maurice), Amiah Miller (Nova), Terry Notary (Rocket), Ty Olsson (Red Donkey), Michael Adamthwaite (Luca), Toby Kebbell (Koba), Gabriel Chavarria (Preacher), Judy Greer (Cornelia), Sara Canning (Lake), Devyn Dalton (Cornelius), Aleks Paunovic (Winter), Alessandro Juliani (Spear). IMDb Rating (12/09/17): 7.5/10 from 133,581 users
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