Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes (2024)

Dir: Wes Ball

Cast: Owen Teague, Freya Allan, Kevin Durand, Peter Macon, William H. Macy

The latest ‘Planet of the Apes’ instalment delivers the ground-breaking visual effects and compelling narrative that have become synonymous with the consistently strong franchise

Ever since its revival in 2011, the five-decade old ‘Planet of the Apes’ franchise has somewhat gone under the radar. With the vast majority of cinemagoers over the past thirteen years being distracted by the Superhero-laden era of modern cinema, the much beloved dystopian saga has quietly gone about its business. Regarded as sleeper hits, the ‘Rise of the Planet of the Apes’, ‘Dawn of the Planet of the Apes’ and ‘War for the Planet of the Apes‘, known collectively as the Caesar trilogy, have gone on to make almost $2 billion at the worldwide box office, while also garnering huge critical success.

Filmmakers Rupert Wyatt and Matt Reeves managed to successfully reboot the franchise with their fresh and grounded vision, a far cry from Tim Burton‘s adaptation in 2001. Aided by ground-breaking visual effects and motion capture technology, Wyatt and Reeves were able to deliver an emotionally compelling and surprisingly bleak trilogy of films, as we follows the iconic legacy character Caesar, expertly portrayed by Andy Serkis, as he progresses from domestic chimpanzee to leader of the Apes.

Raised by James Franco‘s Dr William Rodman, whose cure for Alzheimer’s inadvertently resulted in mankind’s downfall,, Caesar broke through discriminatory convention to rise through the ranks as the now intellectual apes took over the planet. Set several generations after Caesar’s time, ‘Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes’ follows aspiring young chimpanzee Noa (Owen Teague), who is a member of the Eagle-clan, a small idyllic ape community who cherish and bond with the majestic predatory birds as per the clan’s ritualistic heritage.

When their commune is attacked by the villainous masked apes, led by the tyrannical Proxima Caesar (Kevin Durand), Noa sets off on an arduous journey to the Pacific coast in a bid to save his fellow clan members from capture. Having met the wise and lonesome Orangutan, Raka (Peter Macon), Noa learns the ways of the real Caesar, a compassionate leader, who spread word that humans and apes once co-existed and that the humans were more intellectual and less feral than they are now. It then comes as a surprise to the pair when a lone human who has been following them on their journey displays signs of intelligence as she introduces herself as Mae (Freya Allan). Meanwhile Proxima, along with his human assistant and teacher, Trevathan (William H. Macy), twists Caesar’s legacy in order to manipulate his kingdom and captives to carry out his bidding.

One of the strengths of these modern iterations of ‘Planet of the Apes’ is the ability to establish the dystopian world and the characters that inhabit it, whether they be ape or human. With Caesar at its centre, the trilogy of sci-fi epics are more than capable of standing on their own as one-off cinematic features, whilst also contributing to the overriding arc of the trilogy. This resulted in the bold decision of no human characters crossing over between films, with the focus solely aimed at Caesar and his ape revolution. With Caesar’s storyline now concluded, I was intrigued as to how the latest instalment would cement itself into the franchise’s mythos, but by having Caesar’s character ‘live on’ through his teachings and legendary status is a master-stroke by director Wes Ball and screenwriter Josh Friedman.

Ball is no stranger to dystopian epics, having helmed all three outings in the underappreciated ‘Maze Runner‘ series, arguably one of the better of the countless young adult franchises to have come out since the turn of the millennium. The American filmmaker fully utilises his past filmography to establish a fully immersive future world where nature has reclaimed the planet, burying any evidence of civilisation under a sea of luscious green forest. It is a true testament to the VFX team to bring Ball’s vision to life, showcasing some of the best visual effects you will see, without the need of hiding them in shadows or under moonlight. Not only are the many species of ape depicted on screen beautifully rendered, each character has its own individuality thanks to subtly unique designs, fully realised by expertly nuanced motion-capture performances.

Being the first film in a new trilogy, ‘Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes’ is given the daunting task of introducing a whole heap of new characters, who we will no doubt become more familiar with over the next few years. There is plenty of great character work on show, with Noa and Raka being two of the standout apes to ever be established in the franchise. It is this exceptional writing which has been present throughout the vast majority of the decade-spanning franchise that keeps this property so engaging for audiences. In the wrong hands the imagery of machine gun wielding talking apes on horseback could very easily be perceived as laughable nonsense, but these striking visuals have gone onto add the surprising amount of weight and grim nature needed to make these films so successful.

However, much like other first parters, ‘Kingdom’ slightly suffers from overwhelming its audience. With a lengthy runtime of 145 minutes, there is plenty of story to unfold, but still several questions marks remain unanswered, as is usually the case with many films when sequels are in development. This did leave me somewhat unfulfilled by the time credits rolled, but if Ball can deliver a fitting sci-fi sequel like Denis Villeneuve managed with Dune: Part Two, I will be more than satisfied.

While it may not have the same resonance of the latter two films in the Caesar trilogy, ‘Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes’ further cements this long beloved franchises legacy as one of the most consistent in cinematic history and with strong early box-office numbers backing it up, hopefully we do not have to wait too long until we return to The Planet of the Apes.

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes is now showing in UK Cinemas.

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