So here we are at The Rise of the Planet of the Apes from 2011! We find Charlton Heston making his 5th appearance in the series. In this movie, Will Rodman works at a science lab and he is looking for a cure for Alzheimer’s because his father, Charles, has been stricken with it. In reality, Heston passed away from it in 2008. This brings it close to my heart because my mother has dementia, a close cousin to this disease and often a precursor to the disease.
The budget for this movie was a whopping $93,000,000!
So into the movie we go…there is a chimp named Caesar who Will brings home and he grows up in their house. He’s very close to Charles:
Caesar works on cognitive skills designed by Will, sign language, and puzzles (the puzzle he works on is the Statue of Liberty, a nod to the original Ape movie, and at another time, Caesar is posing as “The Thinker”, the famous French sculpture).
At the lab, Will is working on a drug for Alzheimer’s, the ALZ112 shot. He steals some and starts injecting his father as he slips further away mentally. It improves his brain function and brings him back. Things are great!
Caesar is taken to the Redwoods to play and sees pets on leashes. At age 5 he questions his life and wonders: Am I a pet?
Soon the Alzheimer’s disease returns to Charles and in a neighborhood event, Caesar violently protects Charles. He goes ape shit! He is taken away and caged at a horrible facility, unbeknownst to Will, with enraged apes in cages. It’s like an insane asylum. He is hosed, tortured, etc. and ends up in a fetal position, feeling left by Will. When will finally returns to visit him and promises, “Trust me. I’ll get you out.” Caesar is disappointed and mad. He has lost his trust for humans.
By this time, Charles has died and Will comes to take him home. Caesar won’t go. His heart has hardened and he is hurt which leads to the great apes escape. Caesar leads a revolt. As in the original movie, we see a famous line, “Take your stinking paw off me you damn dirty ape!” Caesar says, “NO!”
The apes are on the loose, kind of like “Apes in the City” (Sex in the City). They tear up the city and let all the animals in the zoo loose. Chaos erupts!
Later, Will finds Caesar and says, “I’m sorry. I’ll take you home.” Caesar responds with, “Caesar is home”, in the wild, in the Redwoods, where he belongs.
Here’s the trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28Z_D9Grh18
Shouldn’t we let the animals live in their natural habitat instead of housing them in zoos?
To me, this was one of the best in the series. It really had me interested!
The Dawn of the Planet of the Apes of 2014 would be my next blog but I have had enough of this series, and of science fiction. It’s time for me to go to my s-hero and one of my all time top 5 fave movies–Gorillas in the Mist!
Book and Movie Therapy 