Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes was a movie I was not sure about. I have enjoyed the other three movies that make up this rebooted franchise, but I was still unsure of how a Ceasar-less Planet of the Apes series would work. I am happy to say that it works really well and out of the four movies this is one of the best.
How to Download Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes
Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes was released on May 10, 2024. You can expect to be able ti download or stream the film from a digital platform such as Hulu about two months later. Click on the Download button at the end of this review and make your choice. Check out also the three previous films in the series: Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011), Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014), and War for the Planet of the Apes (2017).
The Movie Review
A New Era of Apes
The movie takes place hundreds of years after the death of Ceasar. In the future, apes are well and truly the dominant species on Earth. Most humans have lost the ability to speak and they are very primal and just live on instinct. One thing that they do very well is get you up to speed on what has led to this.
There is no long and boring introduction that is hard to follow for those who have not seen the other movies or those who have not seen them for a long time. It is a few sentences and you know all you need to know about this world and where our story is starting from. I have to give the filmmakers a ton of credit for this.
Meet Noa: The New Hero
Our main character is a young ape called Noa. Noa is part of a clan of peaceful apes that have close ties to eagles with each ape when they come of age, getting their own eagle to raise. I liked how we saw that they had built their homes on these huge what looked like cell phone towers.
Noa is a very likable character from the start. We see him and his two friends try to get their eagle eggs before their coming-of-age ceremony. However, something very bad happens and a rival destructive group of apes finds them and destroys their home, and takes the surviving apes with them as prisoners to perform slave labor for another ape, Proximus who is obsessed with getting his hands on human technology. Proximus is an amazing villain, he is crazy, but he well and truly believes that he is right.
An Unlikely Alliance
An interesting twist is that Noa meets another ape along with a human woman. This human woman is not feral, she can not only talk, but she is very smart as well. Noa and this woman team up to try and save Noa’s clan, but in typical “human” fashion. There is more to this young woman than she is letting on.
Twists and Turns
Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes is one of those movies where you really do not want to read any spoilers before you see it. There are some very interesting twists and turns here and I could not be any more excited for what comes after this! War for the Planet of the Apes was like the big end to that trilogy and it was massive. Well, if things go the way that this sets up, it could make that conflict in War look very small by comparison!
Stunning Visuals
The Planet of the Apes reboot series has looked amazing right from Rise many years ago. However, the special effects here are just stunning! The apes look so real, it is more the facial features than anything else that blew me away. The way that they can show so many emotions such as anger, fear, sadness, and even love is truly remarkable.
A Must-See
I could not be any happier with how Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes turned out. I was a little unsure before the movie started, but within the first ten minutes, this story and the new characters had me hooked. I highly and I mean highly recommend that you make the effort to go and see this on the big screen.
