Dawn of the Planet of the Apes

Leaving aside Tom Felton not managing to kick-start a proper post-Potter film career, the first Apes film was a pleasant surprise. It dealt sensitively with Alzheimer’s and pretty cleverly got me engaged with ape characters.

But the sequel was certainly better. It did exactly what a sequel should do – take advantage of the first film having set the scene and go for something altogether grander in scale, more emotionally involved and more intelligent.

Ten years on, the lab-developed virus that became simian flu has wiped out most of the world’s population. Thus we can have this film set in the currently-fashionable gritty post-apocalyptic world familiar from many zombie properties. Indeed, the main thrust of the story reminded me of one section of The Last of Us – a fairly small human colony can get power from a hydroelectric dam, but getting the power back on is not without difficulties.

The dam, of course, is in ape territory. Caesar and co have set up a self-sustaining little colony, where not only do the apes hunt on horseback and craft tools, but they even learn the rudiments of English – written and, on occasion, spoken. Caesar has a wife and two sons, now, one the somewhat difficult adolescent Blue Eyes and one an adorable newborn. After over two years without any human sightings, he begins to feel that they have died out. However, a human expedition and one idiot with an itchy trigger finger soon shows they have not. When our leading man, played by Jason Clarke – who I don’t think I’ve seen in anything before this – reaches out a hand of friendship, Caesar gives him a chance, allowing him, his medically-trained wife, his weedy son and a dam engineer access to the dam. But the engineer is the one who shot the first ape he met, and likely isn’t to be trusted. If Caesar doesn’t start a conflict with the humans, maybe his more aggressive second-in-command Koba will. Maybe he’ll even be prepared to do so with a false flag attack.

Gary Oldman pitches his weak-leader figure just right, though his grand final gesture is almost ridiculously pointless, and the main cast of humans fill their rolls well, but once again this is really much more about the apes than the human beings. The main lesson to learn here is not to judge entire groups, because any group might have the bad apple who ruins it for everybody – and any group might have the guys willing to work for a better world, too.

Let’s not fool ourselves that this isn’t classic, tried-and-tested cinema, only with apes for the savage tribe / mysterious aliens / noble natives. But that’s okay, because it’s done well, and spectacularly. Some of the action sequences get a bit absurd, especially when there’s an ape on horseback leaping through flames with a fully automatic in each hand, or when a tank is commandeered to ram some doors – though the latter is in a remarkably beautiful and well-done action shot. I also found the whole ‘apes follow the strongest’ line slightly dubious when there are goddamn gorillas in the pack – surely they’re the strongest, and surely they sometimes come into conflict with the leaders?

Planet of the Apes continues to provide good surprises – I’ve not particularly wanted to see either of the films, but when I’ve gone to see them, I’ve ended up enjoying them. And what’s more – respecting them.