On April 1, 2014 Oakland University, located in Rochester, Mi., announced a new Bachelorâs Degree in âPost-Apocalyptic Survival Studies,â no doubt driven by the number of major motion pictures depicting that scenario. Fortunately, it was an April foolâs joke, but it wouldnât surprise me if someday soon, they go forward with it. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes is the sixth post-apocalyptic film released in the past several months, with more in the offing this summer.
Earlier last week in plenty of time for my deadline, I went to see one of those six, entitled Snowpiercer. I was motivated by one of my favorite (major newspaper) critics who gave it a B+. It was without a doubt one of the worst movies ever (a negative four stars), and I refused to burden my favorite bi-weekly newspaper with that movie review. With my back against the wall and the deadline now 24 hours past due, I had to seek out something worth writing about that was a fairly new release. âApesâ had a three star rating from a number of big time newspaper critics. How could I go wrong? Easy, I went see it! I picked a 10 a.m. matinee, and fortunately I had a nutritious bowl of oatmeal before going, which helped me stomach it.
To be fair, the special effects, set designs, artwork, etc. were all fantastic. There will probably be Oscar nominations stemming from some of that, obviously done by very competent people. The talent stopped there, however, as the story line, scripting, and acting were inferior at best.
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
Entertainment Rating: ★★ (Barely)
Rating: PG-13, this should be R rated for the destructive and consistent violence and death, five or six profanities, most of them in one brief scene.
Possible Oscar Nominations: Special Effects, Set Design, Production Design, Art Decoration, Musical Score and Makeup
As the movie opens, we find that the human race has been mostly eradicated by the âsimian fluâ virus, which was prepared in labs experimenting on the very creatures that survived, who eventually grew to a substantial population and even learned to talk. The apes thought there were no humans left, the humans didnât know about the apes. Lo and behold, they run into each other in the deep woods, and well, you can probably guess. Efforts at peace, harmony, and understanding are eradicated by one malcontent on each side and the resulting conflict features apes riding on horses firing sub-machine guns. You can take it from there.
Gary Oldman, Jason Clarke, and Keri Russell as the lead humans take a bad script and make it worse. Fortunately for him, the leader of the Apes, played by Andy Serkis, had a mask on so no one will recognize him.
As one scribe from the Associated Press put it: âit feels like yet another manufactured franchise,â which it most assuredly appears to be.
Comments or questions, tsansom2002@gmail.com.
