From left, Raka (Peter Macon), Noa (Owen Teague) and Mae (Freya Allan) in “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.” Credit: 20th Century Studios/TNS
The first “Planet of the Apes” film — released in 1968 — became the start of a long-standing franchise that now encompasses nine movies, three reboots, one live-action show and one animated show.
In the latest “Planet of the Apes” timeline — which began with the reboot “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” in 2011, continued with “Dawn of the Planet of the Apes” in 2014 and was followed by “War for the Planet of the Apes” in 2017 — apes have become the dominant species on Earth after a man-made virus tested on the primates backfired and granted them hyper-intelligence, including the ability to speak, all while simultaneously wiping out most of the human race — still a strange concept.
The first three films in the rebooted franchise followed Caesar (Andy Serkis), who is the first ape to gain intelligence. He began building his ape empire in this trilogy, while juggling rising tensions with remaining humans at the same time.
“Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes” finds this world long after Caesar’s reign, instead following a young chimp named Noa (Owen Teague) who seeks revenge on a rival tribe of apes that destroyed his family’s village. He’s joined by an orangutan Raka (Peter Macon) — a historian who spends much of the film archiving previous films’ events to preserve Caesar’s words — and a human named Mae (Freya Allen).
The Earth in “Kingdom” is completely unrecognizable from the planet humans presently know, or even the freshly apocalyptic scenes of the previous three films. Rather, foliage has completely overgrown crumbling man-made structures, leading to massive skyscrapers of trees that are almost “Avatar”-esque.
In fact, “Kingdom” can draw more than one comparison to the “Avatar” franchise. Director Wes Ball, who also directed “The Maze Runner” trilogy, elected to use motion-capture suits to have actors directly perform as their ape counterparts, which is a similar technique to James Cameron’s blue aliens in “Avatar.”
The result is highly fluid and creates more dynamic camera work compared to other “Planet of the Apes’’ films, allowing viewers to get closer to the action and feel like they’re right next to the characters.
Much like “Avatar,” it’s the visuals of “Kingdom” that are the film’s brightest spots. The iconic cinematographic color combination of teal and orange pops beautifully off the screen in the form of crashing waves and fiery explosions during the movie’s second half, which is primarily set on a coastline.
Apart from that, the set design of the overflowing, jungly landscape of the “Planet of the Apes” is breathtakingly constructed, looking so realistic that the mossy earth scents can almost be smelled in the theater.
If the best part of “Kingdom” is the cinematography, unfortunately, it’s the story where weakness can be noticed. A major issue of the latest installment, as opposed to its predecessors, is that the dialogue is primarily spoken by the apes, with much less of the film devoted to human subplots. Since the apes take much more time to form sentences than humans, it adds to an already bloated runtime that could easily be trimmed down.
“Kingdom” also misses the screen presence of Caesar, the leader of the apes in both the original and the reboot franchises. However, this role is filled by Proximus (Kevin Durand), the film’s ape antagonist who drips with charisma as he plays a cult leader similar to an ape version of an adversary that would be found in a “Mad Max” film.
If there’s one main reason why the “Planet of the Apes” franchise has been able to thrive for so long, it’s that no matter how weak or strong a plot is, it’s always entertaining to watch primates act like humans for a couple of hours. Any audience member who enjoys that simple pleasure will undoubtedly have a good time with “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.”
Rating: 3.5/5
