Friday, August 12, 2011

The Minority Report - "Rise of the Planet of the Apes" (2011)


Caesar is home.

This movie definitely had big shoes to fill to say the least. The original “Planet of the Apes” film was absolutely superb in most every way, and a prequel claiming to give rise to the former needed to do outshine all of the previous attempts. That it did. I love the original series and was looking forward to this movie, unlike some of my counterparts. It seemingly came out of nowhere and proved that sequels (or prequels, for that matter) can be excellent movies in and of themselves.

The story begins with a scene in Africa, where the natives are capturing apes. They are getting shipped to a testing facility under the direction of a man by the name of Will Rodman (James Franco) who is in the process of developing a cure for Alzheimer’s, which he tests on the captured apes. Soon, he finds that one of the apes has immensely increased intelligence due to the ALZ-112 drug he is developing. They present the results to a board of directors and investors that wish will decide to market the product or not, but the meeting is disrupted by the intelligent ape, who is shot. It turns out she was a female and had lashed out only because she felt her baby, who she had given birth to secretly, was threatened by the researchers. This puts a damper on Will’s plan to possibly cure Alzheimer’s since his lab is left without chimps after they force the researchers to put them all down, and because he also takes the baby chimp to his home so that it won’t get killed like the others. There, he raises it to keep his father, Charles (John Lithgow), who has Alzheimer’s, company. What began as a temporary house guest soon becomes part of the family as he gains more and more intelligence along the way. Will records the progress and realizes that the ape, whom he named Caesar (Andy Serkis), has inherited the genes for intelligence from his mother. Soon, terrible circumstances force Caesar into a situation where he has to take charge and grow as an ape and as an eventual person. The future of the world is at stake.

Treading a fine line between retribution and compassion, Caesar’s character accepts the role of protagonist in an inspiringly human way. The emotions displayed by the apes and humans alike drag you in and don’t let go. You find yourself hoping and praying that the apes get their way, as the conditions for both sides get worse and worse. Will’s fight against the ravages of Alzheimer’s on his father is emotionally charged and deeply saddening. Here is a man who has dedicated his entire life to save his father, but has created something different as a result. Special praise has to be given to Weta Digital—the company which created the special effects in the film. If the apes wouldn’t have been so realistic, the drama would not have been felt the way it was. The interaction between the real world and the special effects was flawless, and the detail and craftsmanship of the apes was impressive. A film both inspiring and terrifying in its scope, it really brings home new ideas on what it is to be human. This film is only slightly like watching paint dry on redwood trees that tell the story of the rise of the apes.


By Kulguy

Friday, August 5, 2011

The Minority Report - "Transformers: Dark of the Moon" (2011)


"Bee, there's something else going on here. The moon program, the cover-ups, the assassinations, it's all led to this..."

After the second movie, I was honestly debating going to see this one. The second one was full of racist and unnecessarily obscene humor, terrible dialogue, and a senseless and overblown plot. The thing is, there was a part of me that wanted to give one of my favorite series as a child a second chance. It was almost as if the Optimus from the original animated series was telling me to do the right thing. So, I ended up watching it. Here’s what I thought…

The film opens up on the planet of Cybertron when a spacecraft called the Ark, known to be carrying an invention capable of ending the long-winded war between the Autobots and Decepticons, escapes from the area and crash lands on the far side of Earth’s moon. NASA detects this and launches the Apollo program with the help of John F. Kennedy to put a man on the moon as a cover for finding the craft. After the astronauts find the craft, the film moves to the present day where the Autobots are helping the US military in a quest for global peace. In their missions, they discover alien technology at Chernobyl and venture to the far side of the moon to find its origins. There, they find Sentinel Prime, one of the leaders of the Autobots, and reboot him in an effort to find out what is going on. He tells them that the secret invention was a space bridge that was meant to teleport matter between two points. All the while, Sam Witwicky (Shia LeBeouf) is upset because he can’t be part of the ongoing missions and has lost almost all connection with his Autobot friends. On his job, he is given information by a coworker who is subsequently murdered by a Decepticon. He attempts to go to the Autobots to tell them about what is occurring as more people lose their lives, and that’s when all hell breaks loose. It leads to the ultimate battle between a great evil and the ultimate force of sentient good in the universe.

As can be ascertained from the description, the plot is still overblown. At least this time, it isn’t exactly senseless. The movie achieves something which its predecessor lacked: it has the feel of the original. Even though the storytelling is still sub-par and some of the humor misses the mark, it tries to be as charming and as fresh as the movie that started the franchise. One thing that has upset me from the beginning and did even more in this movie is how Michael Bay focuses a few too many minutes of precious plotline on shots of the female ‘lead’ (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley)—if she could be called that. It almost makes her a selling point in the movie. I understand the phrase ‘sex sells,’ but there are still people out there that enjoy a movie because it is good and not because some English model is walking around looking surprisingly not beat up and dusty in every scene after an explosion. Apart from that, I must mention that I watched it in 3D and, once again, I don’t think it was worth it. One of my cousins was with me and, being 7 years old, I expected him to enjoy the 3D depth and action. As it turns out, after we left the theater, he said he had decided that he didn’t really like 3D. Good man. This movie is like watching paint dry on a pillar that is teleporting sentient robot beings to destroy the Earth.


By Kulguy