We're only a few weeks out from Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes, but there's still surprises lurking.
We saw footage from the upcoming movie in Comic-Con's cavernous Hall H. So how exactly did those damn dirty apes blow it up? Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes is a prequel to the remarkably resilient sci-fi series that managed to survive a Tim Burton mangling. James Franco stars as Will Rodman, a scientist working on an Alzheimer's treatment with apes as the test subjects. His first success, Caesar (played by Andy "Gollum" Serkis) gains enhanced intelligence and foments a primate revolution. The cast also includes Frieda Pinto, John Lithgow (not as an ape, sadly) and Brian Cox. The other apes are all motion-captured CGI as well.
The segment didn't start out so well, with a brief clip from the "20th Century Fox Research Library" purporting to show a chimpanzee somewhere in Africa being taunted by a group of ludicrously racist, gaudily-dressed African soldiers before picking up an AK-47 and opening fire on them. This really didn't fill us with much faith in how the actual movie will handle the material.
Director Rupert Wyatt talked about some of the film's strongest points, giving praise to Serkis's mastery of performance capture art. A second clip was also shown, which really displayed WETA' spectacular work - the nuances of Serkis's motions and expressions are translated beautifully to Caesar, especially in the face. After the clip rolled, Serkis came on stage to talk about the challenges of the part, and one of the strongest aspects of the film seems to be the real attention it pays to Caesar as the actual protagonist of the film. The film was actually shot on a live-action set, not a greenscreen, and it shows - the CGI is integrated remarkably well.
A third clip was shown, early on in the film where Caesar attacks a man who is yelling at Rodman's father, who suffers from Alzheimer's. The chimp viciously brutalizes the poor sap, biting off his finger before Lithgow calls him off. This then segued into a fourth clip with Caesar escaping the ape sanctuary, returning to Rodman's apartment to steal his Alzheimer's drug (conveniently stored in his fridge). He returns to the sanctuary and doses his fellow primates, bringing the rest of them up to his intellectual level overnight. The ape performances look strong, and if it can deliver sheer animal mayhem like it promises, it'll be worth catching.
Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes opens August 5th, 2011.
