Red State

The Five Points Trinity Church is an independent Christian church known for their extreme views on homosexuality and regularly protest at funerals, while they all reside in their own fenced-off sanctuary known as Cooper’s Dell. Meanwhile, three high school kids are all looking to get laid. Jared finds a woman on the internet who says she’ll sleep with him, Travis and Billy Ray all at the same time. They go to meet her in a trailer in the woods, but as they prepare for their sexual awakening, they all pass out, and wake up to find themselves deep in the heart of Cooper’s Dell...

I am, unashamedly, a MASSIVE Kevin Smith fan. I’ve seen all of his films and own all but a couple of them on DVD. I follow him on Twitter. I’m an avid listener to the Smodcast Podcast Network of podcasts. I even find the time to listen to Smodcast Internet Radio every day to listen to him and his wife do his live daily breakfast show... at 4pm. So, naturally, I’ve followed the creation and conception of this film, his most radically different to date, from the faux-auction publicity stunt at Sundance to the Westboro Baptist Church protests to the self-distribution release to the Red State Q&A tour. This month, the film was released on VOD in America and finally received a proper cinematic release both here and the US. Well thank the lord I’ve finally seen it, because it is epic.

I won’t lie; I’ve been looking forward to this film the most this year. This was the 2011 film I wanted to see, more than Green Lantern or The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (which I am still eagerly awaiting), and my God has this lived up to the hype. This film is, for lack of a better word, insane. It is the most un-Kevin Smith ‘Kevin Smith’ film yet. It starts off like a proper Kevin Smith film, mind, with teenagers looking for sex, but then the film turns into a real drama focusing on the Five Points Trinity Church, a church with scarily similar views to those of the Phelps family from the Westboro Baptist Church. Then, it turns again into a gun-wielding, bullet spraying action film for the final third before rounding things up neatly. I’ll try not to spoil this as much as I can, because the less you know about the plot going into this, the more surprised you will be by this. As soon as you think you know where it’s going, it flips your expectations on their head and takes you somewhere completely different.

At the core of this are two scarily phenomenal performances from the two leads: Michael Parks and Melissa Leo. Leo filmed this before she won her Oscar, so that wasn’t in her head, allowing her to focus on giving a fantastic performance as the creepy and devoted Sarah Cooper. However, the stand out is Parks as Abin Cooper, head of the church. He delivers every line with conviction and realism that you believe in the character and you believe he truly believes in the religious dogma he constantly spouts. In particular, at one point, Parks delivers a near 10 minute monologue which is just incredible to watch. John Goodman turns up as ATF agent Keenan and does well in a well-written, realistic role. Kerry Bishé also does well in her role as a member of the Cooper clan, as does a mute Ralph Garman and an intimidating James Parks. The kids all do well but aren’t anything truly special, and besides, it’s the Cooper’s Dell clan who all steal the show.

At the centre of this film is a sharply written script by Smith, something which was lacking from his last outing Cop Out, the first and only film where Smith was a director for hire. It’s a satire that clearly takes its cues from the Phelps’, but it’s also a horror as Smith takes it in a far more extreme direction whilst still retaining utterances of classic Smith dialogue and jokes about pussy and sex. There are an ungodly number of fucks used in the film, as every character seems intent on repeating it over and over again as if to overstate the importance of each scene, whether it’s through fright or frustration or liberation of self. Don’t let that fool you though; listen past the profanities and you’ll hear some smart dialogue delivered by master technicians. It’s clever, it’s funny, it’s pointed, and at times it’s downright scary. Most of all, it’s engrossing and engaging. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from it for a second, you end up not wanting to in fear you’ll miss something because Smith throws everything but the kitchen sink at you for the short 88 minutes it takes him to tell the story.

Don’t get me wrong, there are a few faults with is. The editing is all over the place, with the faster rapid cuts seeming unnecessary and don’t fit in the film, but the slower edits with longer shots between cuts add to the tension and suspense and work well. It does seem to rush through its events quickly given the running time, there could have been a lot more time spent on certain scenes throughout the film. Also, while some of the characters are fully developed, most aren’t, and a lot of them aren’t given any dialogue, and just go through the film mute, which is an odd choice, given Smith’s particular way with words. In most other cases, I’d let little hang ups like this spoil my enjoyment of a movie, and yet I thoroughly enjoyed Red State despite all of this, which shows just how good a film this truly is.

Overall, I realise I say this as a completely biased Kevin Smith fan, but my god is this good. It is so unexpected, and that’s what makes this so good. Considering his back catalogue, this film has comes out of absolutely nowhere and surprised even the most hardened fans of his like myself. Considering I’ve been keeping up to date with the production of this film, I probably knew what to expect more than others, but it still surprised me as to where it went and how it went about it. I’ll also say that it’ll be a crime if Michael Parks at the very least isn’t considered for top awards for his performance here; it’s truly an outstanding piece of work from both him and Smith. Smith has well and truly pulled it out the bag, and given that this is due to be his second to last film, I can only hope that the kind of quality he’s produced here carries forward onto Hit Somebody, his planned last movie. There are faults with the film, it doesn’t explore the issues raised but rather exploits them for its own means, but it earns a stellar review by subverting my expectations constantly and by being his best film in years, possibly even ever. I urge you to watch this for yourselves and be converted.

Rating: *****

The Change-Up

Dave and Mitch have been friends since childhood, but their lives have gone in different directions; Dave is a family man, married with kids, and working hard as a lawyer, whereas Mitch is living a hedonistic lifestyle, sleeping with various women and only occasionally working with any kind if responsibility. One night, while peeing into a fountain after a drunken night out, they both wish they had each others' lives. They wake up the next morning to find their wishes have come true, and the hilarity ensues from there...

The age/body swap is a staple of the comedy genre. Seriously, do you realise how many times it's been done in various formats? Freaky Friday (3 times), Big, 17 Again, 18 Again!, Vice Versa, 13 Going On 30, even Being John Malkovich... The list goes on and on. My point is it's been done multiple times, so for a film like this to come out and work, it's going to have to be original. The Change-Up promises something original: The American Pie route. We've been promised the most disgusting, extreme, gross-out age/body swap comedy of all time! So, is it a gross-out film? At times, yes, yes it is, they've gotten that right. So has that made this an original piece of work within the genre? Absolutely not.

The Change-Up is so formulaic that you know exactly where it's going right from the start. There are no surprises or shocks in this, and adding lots of poo and urine jokes does not make it original, it just shows how lazy the writers were, looking to grab some of that Hangover revenue that's become so lucrative over the last few years (which is hardly surprising, given this was actually written by the writers of The Hangover). In the first two minutes, poor Jason Bateman gets covered in baby crap. That's the level we're at, people. This film is pretty uninventive and has 'pay day' written all over it. It's a real shame for Bateman, who's really let himself down by getting involved with a film like this after appearing in the fairly decent Horrible Bosses earlier in the year; it seemed as if he'd left films like this and The Switch behind, but alas not, and he deserves a lot better than this.

Speaking of Bateman, he does well in a complicated role. He spends most of the films playing Ryan Reynolds playing Reynolds' character, much as Reynolds spends the film playing Bateman playing Bateman's character. It all gets complicated when you try and explain/think about it, but once the characters are established at the start of the film as polar opposites, it becomes an easier task to follow just who exactly is playing who and when. All this means Bateman gets to play against type for the film, playing the wildcard rather than the straight guy, and he does OK with it but it doesn't feel like a natural performance, it feels as forced as it looks and shows why he's better playing the straight guy. Reynolds, however, does well in both roles, playing the wildcard well initially and then playing the straight guy very well, picking up on Bateman's usual mannerisms and portraying them on screen near-perfectly.

No-one said this was a clever film, but we were promised laughs. It does raise a few to be fair, but they are few and far between, which is mildly disappointing but not entirely surprising. Honestly, an alarmingly large percentage of the film only serves to make the viewer uncomfortable in watching it because of how unfunny it is. There's no real inventiveness either, the film covers a lot of old ground and doesn't do anything with it, doesn't put a funny or inventive twist on it and just disappoints. I feel kind of dirty having laughed at some of the jokes the film offers up - I'm disappointed in myself for stooping so low. It's real low-rent humour, but it could have been so much worse. It's certainly not on par with, say, The Hangover Part II, but it's still nowhere near the levels Bridesmaids or even Horrible Bosses reached earlier this year.

Overall, it is a disappointment, but an entirely unsurprising disappointment. This never looked like a great film, not even a good film, and it's not, so you only have yourself to blame when you leave the cinema feeling dirty, ashamed and disappointed. There's a couple of laughs, and on paper it's an interesting notion to see Reynolds and Bateman play against type, but put into practice and it really doesn't work. The film never really gets off the ground; it stays at one level and adamantly refuses to reach for anything higher or more intelligent. It's puerile, gross, disgusting, unintelligent, uninventive... The list goes on and on. Much like the list of age/body swap comedies this unfortunately joins. If you've chosen to watch this over any of the far superior films out this month, nay this week, then shame on you, you deserve exactly what you get with this.

Rating: **

Fright Night

Charley Brewster is an ordinary kid growing up in Las Vegas with a girlfriend and hanging out with the cool kids. Then, a mysterious stranger called Jerry moves in next door. Charley’s former friend, Ed, tells Charley he believes Jerry is a vampire responsible for the disappearance of a number of fellow students, but Charley doesn’t believe him. However, the next day, Ed himself disappears, and Charley begins to believe. After a close encounter with Jerry, Charley searches out the one man who he thinks will be able to help him defeat Jerry: Vegas magician and self-styled ‘vampire expert’ Peter Vincent...

It’s only September. Surely a vampire movie like this is being released a month too early. Nevertheless, Fright Night is a 3D remake of the 1985 original of the same name. As to why exactly this was remade is unclear, but the original was certainly well received at the time and it seems as if today’s movie market is giving licence to any filmmaker who wants to resurrect any successful 1980’s horror franchise, whether it be with a reboot or remake or belated sequel (A Nightmare on Elm Street, anyone?) and so, here we are. So can it justify its resurrection after more than 20 years of lying dormant? Can it hold a place in today’s busy film industry? Surprisingly, yes, yes it can.

Fright Night is predicated on the notion that the concept of the horror/vampire film should be self-knowing and aware of its absurdity, and Fright Night has its tongue firmly in its cheek. That’s probably what makes this film work; it knows it’s a silly concept and never truly takes itself seriously. The acting is over the top from all involved (seriously, there’s more ham on display here than on the deli counter at Tesco’s) and it manages to engage its audience well from start to finish, providing a nice entertaining 100 minute motion picture that never drags its feet and says everything it wants and needs to say within its time limit. There’s even a clever, self-knowing nod to the original when Chris Sarandon pops up in a cameo appearance. It’s all in good fun, honest!

As far as the acting goes, it’s all pretty good, again surprisingly so. Colin Farrell plays the 400 year old vampire Jerry and does so with plenty of sickening charm and brooding seriousness. It’s a ridiculous performance, but fits well within the film, so it’s hard to tell if Farrell has adapted his style to suit the film or whether he played his role with lashings of ham and cheese completely by accident. Same goes for David Tennant playing Peter Vincent. He plays Vincent with aplomb, recalling The Doctor in sheer ludicrousness with the over the top character, delivering a performance which matches the character perfectly and really brings him to life. Anton Yelchin plays the protagonist Charley, and does OK with what is a disappointingly uninteresting character. Imogen Poots has the best anme I’ve heard in a while, but is insignificant and flat. Christopher Mintz-Plasse does well playing the same character he’s played in several film now, and certainly produces a surprise.

What makes this film watchable is the sharp script, which is self-knowing and referential to the vampire film canon, making references to Twilight and proving/dispelling various vampire myths in order to fit around the plot. It plays with its concept nicely and never slips into anything too serious, aside from the mild peril the protagonists are placed in while fighting Jerry. The most disappointing thing about this film? It was shot in 3D. At least it was actually shot in 3D and not converted in post-production, but the 3D is so unnecessary. I saw it in 2D and it was dark enough as it was, which is understandable given that this is a vampire film, therefore most of the action has to take place at night and in the dark. Even watching it in 2D, you can see which parts were designed to use the 3D technology, and it’s all cheap and nasty effects which add absolutely nothing to the plot. If you can watch this in 2D, do it, stay away from the glasses.

Overall, it’s not too bad and certainly justifies its resurrection. As long as there aren’t any sequels, this will be a fine addition to the franchise; I just can’t see how they could make a good, justifiable sequel given the events of this film. It’s entertaining, full of funny performances and is certainly worth paying to see on a Friday night as long as it’s the 2D version. Unfortunately, this is another case of 3D spoiling what could have been a great film. As it is, 3D viewers will walk away feeling cheated and that’s the real shame. There is a good film behind the gimmick, and the sooner this particular gimmick disappears the better, as it will give films like this a better chance of succeeding.

Rating: ***1/2

Final Destination 5

A group of co-workers, including Sam, his ex Molly, his best friend Peter and his girlfriend Candice, along with others, head out on a bus trip to a company retreat. However, on the bus, Sam has premonitions of a bridge collapse that would kill them all. Sam convinces his friends and a select few others to get off the bus and the bridge, just as the bridge collapses, much as his premonition had suggested. Sam and his friends have cheated Death, but Death doesn’t like to be cheated. Sam and his friends were meant to die, and one by one, Death will claim the lives of those who should have died earlier...

The Final Destination is a very simple franchise with a basic premise that has been repeated in what is now 5 films: Someone has premonition of death, convinces friends to escape scenario and cheat Death, scenario occurs, friends wonder what happened, Death comes to claim the lives of those who escape in a number of unfortunate accidents, and Tony Todd stands by the side, telling everyone he knew this would happen. Five films of that, no differences. It’s a wonder the franchise has gotten this far, but alas we have the fifth instalment in non-glorious 3D in cinemas now. So is it still a fresh idea? Surprisingly, yes.

The problem with the Final Destinations compared to a franchise like Saw is that FD only has one basic story that has to be repeated over and over again to tie together the gruesome deaths or else it’s an entirely different film. The Saw franchise could invent different plots and convolute storylines to tie together the deaths. The main selling point of the Final Destination franchise, much like the main selling point of the Saw franchise, was the inventiveness of the death scenarios. Let me tell you, there are some real diamonds this year. Although apparently, Death is a screenwriter, because he’s come up with some awfully convoluted scenarios in which to kill his unwitting victims. He also likes the classic horror swerve, where you assume everything’s leading in one direction until suddenly, at the very end, something comes out of nowhere.

This is true of the first two deaths most certainly, as there’s an awful lot going on and the way the deaths pan out leave a few elements either unexplained or unused, there simply to fool the audience into going in one direction before taking them in the completely the other. Saying that, I’m not complaining about that, as it shows there’s been a fair amount of thought put into each of them, and some of them are really original and clever with a decent amount of blood and gore thrown in, and I’m always appreciative of that. On top of that, the film actually look pretty damn good, the CG work looks convincing and the direction of Steven Quale, whilst nothing special, is better here than in certain previous instalments, clearly taking a cue from his experience as second unit director on Avatar.

The performances are, throughout, nothing special. None of the lead actors/actresses deliver anything special, but I put the blame for that squarely onto the script. Whilst the story holds together, much as it has done for the four previous films, and the death scenes are done well, the dialogue stinks. It’s classic horror tropes played out over 90 minutes; there’s the guilt of the party, the love story between the two leads, the “we cheated Death” moments, there’s an asshole who deserves to die, there’s an innocent who is too stupid to live, there’s a schemer who gets their come-uppance... These characters have all been done before and, frankly, they’re all played. Even Tony Todd comes back and plays the same role he played in 1 and 2 and isn’t given anything special to do, which is somewhat of a waste. However, amongst this criticism, I will say there’s a very nice, clever little twist at the end which I won’t spoil, but quite honestly I was impressed by it and I really didn’t see it coming. If you did, you’re a better man than me.

Overall, I had low expectations for this, but this surprised me by being mildly entertaining and able to justify its creation. It’s certainly better than the last two films I’ve seen, and definitely better than the last two Final Destination instalments. Obviously, it could never reach the ‘heights’ of the first, much as in any horror franchise, as the element of surprise is lost, but it plays out fairly well, ambles along towards its conclusion and ties things up in a neat little bow. Hollywood needs to learn the distinction between so bad it’s good and just plain bad. To be fair, there are points in which this is actually stand-alone good, but for the most part, it’s a good piece of silly, cheesy fun where you know exactly where things are going. However, for a film called FINAL Destination, it’s already at its fifth instalment. You can almost guarantee there’s going to be a sixth, but I won't complain as long as it's as inventive as this one.

Rating: **1/2

Conan the Barbarian

Conan has had a troubled childhood: His mother died during childbirth, while his father raised him to be a warrior and to realise the importance of steel to the Cimmerian people. When a group of warriors ride in, destroy the village and kill the villagers, Conan’s father must sacrifice himself in order to save the young Conan. From that point on, Conan becomes older, wiser, stronger and better with a blade as he endlessly seeks out the warlord who brought destruction upon his life. His quest leads to Conan becoming a true barbarian...

I’m truly at a loss. I'll be honest, normally when I watch a film, I'll sit down as soon as possible to write a review so that you get my immediate reaction to it without anything influencing my judgement. With this, I struggled. I'm not a fan of these fantasy/swords/sorcery films or other media at all. I don't like The Princess Bride. I've never read a Terry Pratchett book. I'm not watching Game of Thrones. And, coming back to the subject at hand, I always found the original Conan the Barbarian dull and uninteresting, I couldn't even find any laughs at how bad it was. All this is why I'm at a loss. I'm at a loss as to why this film even exists, and I was at a loss as to how exactly I could write a fair and balanced review without bringing in my personal prejudices. I shall try, but no promises.

I just find the whole genre uninteresting. The only thing which is somewhat close to this which I liked was the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and that's almost an entire world apart, so this was always going to be a struggle for me. Upon watching it, I wasn't at all surprised by this. The plot was very samey and cobbled together from various classic stories, the screenplay cheesy and packed full of clichés and the characters were two dimensional and uninviting. However, I can recognise that this film does exactly what's expected of it: There's plenty of fighting, lots of it with swords and such, there's some nice looking ladies, there's a big action hero, and lots of revenge killing. But that's not enough when there isn't a gripping story behind it, rather too much of the action on screen hinges on either a silly convoluted premise or nothing at all, providing some mindless and senseless action. To some that my appeal, but certainly not to me.

That's the main thing I took away from this film: There was a lot of blood, and a surprising amount of boobs on show. This is definitely a film for the guys. Saying that, the female antagonist is played by gorgeous Rose McGowan, and here she's completely unrecognisable, she looks hideous as the powerful witch and it's a waste of her looks, but she actually comes across well as the villain. Now we're taking about performances, let's go to Jason Momoa, who plays the Barbarian himself, and is very good and swinging a sword and looking strong. His delivery of dialogue isn't particularly impressive but it doesn't need to be, because this really isn't about the story, is it? Ron Perlman turns up as Conan's father, and I like Perlman as an actor, and he's OK in this, seemingly playing a human Hellboy. Rachel Nichols plays the female protagonist Tamara and again, she doesn't need to be a good performer, she just needs to look good and she does. Stephen Lang is probably the best actor in the film, playing the antagonist Khalar Zym. I have a theory it's easier to be bad than to be good on screen, and this film proves my theory.

To be honest, this film is just flat. I think that's why I'm having such a hard time forming an opinion on it; it's hard to form an opinion on nothing and that's what this film is. The action isn't major in the grand cinematic scale of things, it's relatively minor, and yet the gore produced is ungodly. The drama isn't there to captivate the audience, and there's no humour in it as if to provide a self-knowing nod. This film has taken itself far too seriously, and that's where its fault lies. Conan has true delusions of grandeur and potential sequels, but based on this, they'll be better off burying this franchise once and for all. Conan has existed since 1932 and in film since 1982, and I've yet to see anything nearly good produced surrounding this character, including this installment.

Overall, it's an unnecessary reboot of a long dormant and ridiculous franchise, made purely to rake in the summer blockbuster money that most cinema goers will gladly fork over for any old rubbish. It's not the worst film I've seen this year, hell not even the worst film I've seen this month, but by no means is it the best. By no means is this even good. I realise this review was short and not at all in depth, but I was never going to like this film, and I could never be subjective about it. There's a good amount of fighting and violence and nudity for a 15, very 300-like, and I appreciated that, but the film just never grabbed me in the way it should do as an outsider looking in to this foreign genre. Apologies, but this film was barbaric.

Rating: *1/2

Cowboys & Aliens

Arizona. 1873. A man wakes up with no memory of who he is, where he is, or what the metal bracelet attached to his arm is. He makes his way to the small town of Absolution, where he meets a mysterious stranger called Ella, and is recognised as Jake Lonergan, a wanted outlaw. Turns out he’s stolen gold from local cattleman Colonel Dolarhyde, and now Dolarhyde wants revenge. However, before he can take his revenge, an alien spacecraft attacks Absolution, and very quickly their feud becomes secondary to the extra-terrestrial invaders who seem hell bent on abducting the locals and destroying everything...

It gives me hope that one day I might be able to enter the film industry whenever I see a film like Cowboys & Aliens come to the cinema. You can picture the pitch meeting, can’t you? “What’s it called?” “Cowboys & Aliens!” “And what’s it about?” “Cowboys & Aliens!” “Well, who does it feature?” “Cowboys & Aliens!” I could go on. Seriously, the film is succinctly and aptly described by its title. This film feature cowboys and it features aliens. Cowboys & Aliens is the be all and end all of this movie. But is there an interesting plot? Is there a reason to watch it? No.

It annoys me that this is so poorly executed because the premise has limitless possibilities to be infinitely cool, and yet it spends so much time trying to balance out the western and sci-fi aspects of the film that it ends up failing on both fronts and being criminally boring and, frankly, awful. It’s too ludicrous to be a western. It’s too dull to be a memorable sci-fi. I realise usually I spend some time ambling towards my point and eventually making a judgement on it, but in this case, I wasn’t even disappointed by the film, I was more infuriated. I’ve been mulling this over for 12 hours as I write this and I don’t think I’ve seen a more frustrating film all year. The story is painfully clichéd and the characters are wooden and two-dimensional.

This wasn’t helped by the casting and/or the performances the cast gave. Daniel Craig is meant to play the classic western brooding, gruff loner/outsider, but you can’t attach yourself to him, even though he’s meant to be the protagonist. They give him a soapy back story and make him the reformed hero, but there’s no emotion involved at all. As for the antagonist, someone needs to help Harrison Ford because I’m fairly sure he had a stroke back in 1983 and no-one checked for the side effects because he went all the way through this, and pretty much every film he’s been in since Return of the Jedi, mumbling his lines and delivering the same facial expression, a seemingly fixed scowl, almost as if he didn’t want to be there. Olivia Wilde is only alright as the female lead Ella, delivering a similar performance to the one she gave in Tron: Legacy but then you don’t need much from her; she just needs to look good. And she does. Above all of this, however, there is a far bigger crime involving one particular piece of casting. Sam Rockwell. He’s here as a secondary character called Doc who doesn’t really do a lot. What a waste. I think Sam Rockwell is a fantastic actor, and has proven himself worthy of lead roles time and again, and to be given a lifeless role like this is shocking. He does well enough with what little screen time he’s given, but good lord is he ever misplaced in this.

I feel like this was a real missed opportunity. They could have avoided every cliché that they so willingly walked into here. Admittedly, the film does deliver exactly what an audience is going to want to see from a film called Cowboys & Aliens. There’s a bar fight. There are abductions. There’s destruction. There are plenty of aliens. There’s a partial romance. In between all that, the writing is just lazy, clearly just a bunch of writers giggling at themselves at the premise and doing nothing extraordinary with it. The script contains some really corking lines like “It’s not your fault” and “I know where they are”, every plot element is flimsily tied together by flashbacks and ‘shocking twists’ and those ‘shocking twists’ are so inane, you’ll either guess them straight away or be dumbfounded as to how ludicrous they are. Naturally, they’re key to the story and deliver information and elements needed to reach the conclusion, but by the time you get there, you’ll be wishing they’d gotten there sooner.

Overall, in case you couldn’t tell, I didn’t like this film. You know when your parents say they’re not mad, they’re just disappointed? Well I wasn’t disappointed, I was maddened by this. It’s infuriatingly banal and uninventive, and that’s what I’ll take away from this. I will say this though, the aliens looked mildly impressive and the landscapes are fittingly stunning, as they should be for a Western, so it doesn’t fail completely. On almost every other level , though, it does. People will naturally flock to see this, and I understand that, but I hope those people walk out as disappointed as I did so that they learn their lesson like I did. Trust me on this: I have seen Cowboys & Aliens SO THAT YOU DON’T HAVE TO.

Rating: *

Rise of the Planet of the Apes

Will Rodman is on the verge of a scientific breakthrough. His drug, AZ-112, may be the cure to Alzheimer’s, but his chimpanzee test subject turns hostile and the experiment is finished. However, she was merely protecting her child, who Will is forced to take home and rescue. Will lives with his father, himself suffering from Alzheimer’s, who takes a shine to the intelligent young chimp and names him Caesar. Over the years, Caesar grows older and wiser, whilst Will’s experimental drug appears to cure his father. However, Caesar is growing too smart for his own good, and after a misunderstanding involving a neighbour, he is sent to a sanctuary. It’s not long, though, before Caesar is using his intelligence to plot his escape with the other mistreated apes...

The Planet of the Apes franchise is legendary. The Tim Burton remake is, frankly, forgettable, but the original five films are solid. The original is a true classic. ‘Beneath the...’ is an apocalyptic horror film. ‘Escape from...’ was silly but good fun. ‘Conquest of...’ is a revolution-filled thriller and thoroughly misunderstood. ‘Battle for...’ showed signs of a failing franchise and ended the original series on a sour note. It makes sense that it would be brought back now, what with the advanced special effects and CGI on offer and that it has the potential to spark up a long dormant franchise with multiple sequels. For all of that to happen though, Rise of the Planet of the Apes is going to have to be good. So is it? Well, quite simply, it is good. Really good.

The interesting thing about this film is that it takes a new spin on the story of apes rising up against their human oppressors. Rather than have actors dressing as apes and talking, representing the evolved ape, the apes here are entirely CGI. They are all motion captured, which gives them realistic movements and facial expressions. The problem they were faced with going down this road, creating apes as we know them, was that there was no way of getting them to communicate with the humans. Enter Caesar, plot device de jour. Caesar is born with the Alzheimer’s drug changing his mind, so he learns sign language and develops superior intelligence. Therefore, we have a link between species, and the overwhelming plot gap is bridged.

This all comes down to yet another phenomenal mo-cap performance by Andy Serkis, then man who brought Gollum to life (and will do again in the two upcoming Hobbit films). He gets the mannerisms exactly right, and never over-exaggerates the facial expressions, keeping Caesar more ape than human in that regard. James Franco is deadly serious in his role as Will, not his usual laid-back stoner character, and he puts in a solid performance. He proves himself to be more than a one-trick pony and takes a lot of cues from his 127 Hours performance here in his facial expressions and mannerisms. Frieda Pinto does well enough as the female lead, and John Lithgow is convincing as Will’s Alzheimer’s stricken father. An honourable mention goes to Tom Felton in his first big post-Potter role as the nasty son of the sanctuary owner. Apparently he plays a bastard well, who knew?

At just under 100 minutes, this isn’t too long and offers enough to keep an audience interested throughout. My only slight problem with this, intelligent apes aside, is how long it takes to develop the idea that the drug is revolutionary and that Caesar is smart. It’s an idea which is brought across to you in the first 20 minutes and yet it still goes on explaining that the “drug is experimental” and that “Caesar has advanced intelligence”. We get it, we do. It takes a while to reach where everyone knows it’s going, where everyone wants it to go, and frankly you’ll be relieved when it does get there. I did like the character of Caesar though, the evolution of his intelligence is handled well and he is a human enough character that you begin to associate and sympathise with him by the end. Of course, the end is well written to leave it open for potential sequels, but then it wouldn’t be a PotA film if it didn’t. Also, there are numerous nods to the past: Mention of a missing space mission, a Statue of Liberty, and even the immortal line “Take your stinkin’ paws off me, you damn dirty ape!” I’ll be honest; the delivery of the line made me completely mark out, the film won me over there and then.

Overall, it’s a fairly solid summer blockbuster, definitely one of the best this year, as it offers a coherent and well-structured narrative and, movie logic aside, neatly explains itself without bordering on the ridiculous. The apes looked good, an improvement on how fake they looked in the trailers, which was a pleasant surprise, and they were given true emotion and heart. This is close to being a great film; it’s an engaging and intelligent film which you can’t really go too far wrong with. This was a really pleasantly surprising film, it completely caught me off guard as to how good it was, and it's ended up being the best film I've seen in months. If you had told me back in April when the trailer was released that this would end up being my favourite film of the summer, I'd have slapped you in the face and called you a liar. I'd say I deserve the slap now.

Rating: ****1/2