The Good, The Questionable, The Bad and Why...

Rating: 7/10 (14 August 2011)

THE GOOD – This movie is my second favorite "Planet of the Apes" movie of all-time. The original one is still on top for me. For a longtime, in the other movies I always had it in the back of my head, "How do a bunch of 'monkeys' takeover the human race?" Of course watching the sequels to the original Planet of the Apes' movie, they drop in tidbits of explanations here and there. Caesar was the center of one of the movies. But it just wasn't done well. Just enough to leave me satisfied, they barely answered the how and why. They showed us the monkeys (okay Apes) taking over but the how and why was never good enough. Two crucial elements to any story. However, this movie really answered all my questions as to how a bunch of primates could come to takeover the planet. Just seeing it makes it all believable. This is the first movie they really got right since the original. The story and acting is on point. But more than that is the universal message about being free of ones oppressors. Almost a theme about slavery. It's always a good movie when humans are rooting for the other team (nonhumans) to win, and people realize they are the bad guys. Reminds me of the colonization theme present in Avatar. So what is
THE QUESTIONABLE parts of this movie. Well if some look too hard they will certainly start to make comments about the CGI work. Nevertheless, to me it was on point. One of the questionable areas of the film was the fact that although Caesar is smart he turns into a full-blown general, leader of the apes "overnight". He knows military operations and can lead his 'people' to safety. He is smart, yes, but has never had any knowledge presented to him on such matters throughout his lifetime. No matter how smart a person is (or ape) battle readiness is a different area all together. Besides that what is
THE BAD – Not much. I mean at the time of this writing the movie got an 8.0 on IMDb. It must be doing something right. Too me, the bad areas of the film may be some of the questionable areas of the film. If one knit picks, they are bound to find problems with any movie. So
WHY do I give this a 7/10 IMDb style or a high 3 out of 4 stars? The movie is just enjoyable. It combines a good story with good action. Plus, as a bonus it wraps up extremely well. And we could see by the end of the movie, for the first time in "Rise of the Planet of the Apes" - this is how we eventually get to "Planet of the Apes".