Motion Capture - Blog Posts

Review: Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes (2014)

Rating: 9.5 of 10

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (or “Dawn” for simplicity) is that rare smart summer blockbuster, but I won’t talk much about the the actual movie other than it is a great and satisfying experience and you should go see it. What I’m gonna talk about is what I think “Dawn” is to Hollywood. It’s an interesting movie, but it also brings out A LOT of interesting points about modern blockbuster landscape in general. Which is, I might say, a sign of an even better–and possibly transformative–movie. 

Being both a sequel (to “Rise of the Planet of the Apes”) and a prequel (to the general franchise), “Dawn” lands itself in a very weird and difficult spot. Sequels too frequently feel like a “been there done that” exercise, especially if the sequel refuses to stray away from whatever formula that succeeded in the first installment. And prequels, by definition, are predestined journeys and generally don’t leave enough room for surprises. Matt Reeves (director) smartly chose to set “Dawn” 10 years after the events of “Rise”, which means: skipping the viral outbreak entirely, making the apes the main characters instead of the humans, and shying as far away from previous movie’s James Franco’s character as possible. In other words, a completely different movie than “Rise”. 

He, however, could not set “Dawn” completely free from the trappings of a prequel. We know that apes would eventually rule the world. Intelligently, we (and Reeves) knew. In fact, plotwise, “Dawn” is not much of a surprise. Some humans want peace, some want war. Some apes want peace, some want war. Several confusions, betrayals, and bad timings later, war ensues. But “Dawn” made itself not necessarily about what happens, but how it happens. It is a journey of emotions, and boy, did “Dawn” pack up some real emotions. The moment we see Caesar’s son’s (Nick Thurston) eyes stared blankly at the person who killed his friend is the exact moment we weep. We’ve long reconciled with the fact that humans are hateful and unsalvageable, but now we see a brand new species pick up on that hatred and ran with it with apparent ease. It is shocking, it is jarring, and it is exactly how it should make us feel. 

All of that emotion is conveyed largely by CGI and motion capture, which is an incredible feat in itself. All praises should go to Weta that worked on the effect, and also Andy Serkis and all the motion capture actors. Yep, I mentioned them as actors, which is what they should be recognized as. It only takes a quick minute to peek into the behind-the-scenes and see the kind of emotionality and physicality that they bring into the characters. 

(BONUS: Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes motion capture clip)

Tangentially, internet listed “Dawn”’s budget as $120 mill which is not at all surprising or that big (or even downright cheap) for a summer blockbuster with heavy effects. Hmm, I’ll just let that sink in for future reference. The very good news is, “Dawn” is a success critics-wise and box-office-wise. It gained an impressive $70 mill in the first weekend (overperforming previous predictions and knocking out Transformers 4 from first place), which means that audience are ready for and apparently like a nontraditional, smart movie. 

Why, nontraditional, you might ask? The general preconception of Hollywood blockbuster (especially for the more fantastical stories) is that general audience need a surrogate. Like Alice in Wonderland, we just need Alice as that normal character that acts as a filtering window to the strange world. That’s why we have Jake Sully of Avatar, Neo of The Matrix, Bella of Twilight, heck, even Frodo of The Lord of The Rings (who is considerably more normal than wizards and elves). That’s why, in almost every fantastical or alienesque world, there’s always a human (or at least human-like) character. There’s a human character in “Dawn”, alright, but if there’s any surrogate it’s not Malcolm the human (Jason Clarke). It’s Caesar the leader of the apes (Andy Serkis). He is the first character we saw, and it is through him we view and feel the ape community. Granted, he is the most human-like of them all (being the one ape who lived so long with a human. But one could argue that Koba (Toby Kebbel) is also human-like in a different fashion), but the preconception that audience couldn’t relate with what isn’t human? Gone with this movie.

Also, maybe half of the movie is practically mute. Granted, there are sign languages and subtitles but Hollywood execs thought that audience hate subtitles too. Who would’ve thought that wild moves like these ones would pay off and audience would relate to the characters no problem? Filmmakers who don’t underestimate the audience and refuse to bow down to the lowest common denominator, that’s who. Hopefully future filmmakers will learn from this movie and succeed even more. 

TL;DR To sum up, “Dawn” is not only a good movie but also a breath of fresh air, because it is what happens if filmmakers respect their audience and try to tell an interesting story instead of hitting bulletpoints.