Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes (2024)

Watched 5/9/24 (theater)

Pleasantly surprised to report that, despite a really slow first 25 minutes and a finale that I’m pretty dubious of, this was just a really uncomplicated, good, old-fashioned adventure movie. Simple, effective script by War of the Worlds and Avatar 2 vet Josh Friedman. Really patient, really understanding of the power of setups/payoffs in the feature screenplay format. And Wes Ball directs the shit out of it to the point where I will now watch his Maze Runner sequels—the update of the apes-hunting-humans sequence was my personal favorite…just really confident, steady, fluid action camerawork. The CG on some of the primates looks better than others, with Raka the Orangutan and Proximus Caesar being the standout successes, but it’s so lacking in mistakes and any kind of cringe factors that in its totality it mostly just displays an identity of a refreshing modern blockbuster, despite being the tenth or eleventh movie in this franchise. And all hail the set design in this that absolutely kicks ass in comparison with some of the other tentpole sci-fi junk these days.

As previously noted, I don’t really think the ending does much for me seeing as I believe this franchise is a bit well-worn when it comes to ideas, but much respect here for just crafting a really professional and satisfying, if barebones, hero’s journey…and hiring a real director to execute on it. Only directing decision that really took me out of it was William H Macy.

Not that Wes Ball needs my blessing—he has a 4-film Hollywood resume with a very high approval rating… But I do want to also compliment his bridge sequence over the river. What a brutal way to lose a quickly-beloved character. It’s so well-staged and so compellingly-edited with the water VFX, and appropriately-paced to make every punch, grab, fall, etc. land with maximum authority. It’s hard to do good PG-13 action period…especially under Disney’s overbearing thumb as of late. So…much props to this Wes Ball dude for performing at such a high level on what could have been such a perfunctory money-grab movie. I think the logistics and Planet of the Apes-isms of this one aren’t really anything incredible…not really anything to write home about; in fact, pretty clunky in the third act. But the directing craft in particular really just blew me away, even as the final-third beats it has to achieve aren’t perfectly to my liking. The guy in charge just put a lot of thought into this and it makes a difference.

7.75/10