When Rise of the Planet of the Apes was first announced, a lot of people raised an eyebrow in the name of skepticism. That was entirely justified at the time, when it had been less than a decade since Tim Burton’s maligned reimagining had left audiences severely underwhelmed, leading to any sequel plans being abandoned.
Folks were also well within reason to ask if we really needed a sixth film in a franchise that had started with an all-time classic back in 1968, especially when none of the subsequent installments managed to come close to recapturing the magic of Charlton Heston’s Planet of the Apes.
As it turns out, we did. Rupert Wyatt relaunched the property in spectacular fashion, delivering a blockbuster that comfortably ranks as one of modern Hollywood’s finest reboots, which then went on to see Matt Reeves deliver back-to-back sequels that firmly entrenched the most recent Planet of the Apes trilogy as a classic three-film arc.
Over a decade later, and subscribers to a pair of rival streaming services still can’t get enough. As per FlixPatrol, Rise of the Planet of the Apes is a Top 10 hit on Hulu, while it’s also the tenth most-watched film on Disney Plus in the United Kingdom.
Andy Serkis may not take top billing in the credits, but Rise is the actor’s show from start to finish. Once again reaffirming his credentials as the undisputed king of performance capture acting, it’s an astonishing and seamless blend between top-tier on-camera work and cutting-edge visual effects, made all the more remarkable by the fact that Caesar doesn’t utter a single word until the end of the second act.