After the execrable POTA remake starring Mark Wahlberg, something had to give

Rating: Null/10 (19 August 2011)

ROTPOTA takes a different tack than the series of the late 60's/early '70's, opting to lend believability to an impossible premise while only asking for just a little bit of suspension of disbelief. The result, if you choose to suspend that disbelief, is pretty impressive, even if not exactly what you might be expecting.
James Franco plays a scientist who becomes immersed in a project to develop a drug to cure brain diseases, including Alzheimer's, which afflicts his father(played by John Lithgow), using apes as test subjects. After a disastrous incident in the lab that results in the death of an ape named "Bright Eyes," Franco finds himself taking care of her offspring, a cute little creature named Caesar. After they take Caesar in, he becomes a part of the family--less of a pet and more of a son.
They observe his amazing abilities as the result of Franco's wonder drug (which is also used to cure the father, at least temporarily), teach him sign language until ultimately the little guy grows into the dangerous beast he is meant to become. When you realize that apes are at least 5 times as strong as humans, it is logical to assume that it will only be a matter of time before his strength and potential ferocity (as well as his instinct for self-protection and the protection of his loved ones) will come out. After an attack on a neighbor, Caesar is brought to a primate facility, which turns out to have a more sinister motive than simply providing apes with a safe haven. This is where all hell breaks loose, and the movie moves from the slower pace of the first half into something resembling all out war between humans and apes (again, I did mention something about suspension of disbelief, right?).
Those who are familiar with the original series will note the uses of character names (Franklin, Caesar, "Bright Eyes", etc.) lines, and themes that are also present here. To some extent, it works. The scene on the Golden Gate Bridge where the mounted police chase down the apes is a great parallel to that famous first appearance of the apes on horseback in the original movie. But to another extent I found the references to the old series a little distracting--did we really need to see Charlton Heston in The Ten Commandments on the TV of the evil primate research lab to remind us that he was in the original? Or did they really need to make use of all the great one-line gems from the original? Nobody, and I mean NOBODY can deliver the "Take your stinking paws off me" line like the late Charlton Heston. ButI'm being picky, as I imagine a lot of fans of the original are being of this take on the series. Overall, this is probably not a good movie for the overly squeamish or those sensitive to the reality of animal cruelty. You will find yourself actively rooting against the humans in this film; you might, like me, wonder how far they are going to go with the whole transition from servile pet-like animals to the self-aware and highly evolved creatures that they had become in the first series. But maybe what you will wind up with is the thought that in Rise of the Planet of the Apes, we have something new and different: a good film to carry on the tradition of a great series.