Planeta dos Macacos: A Guerra

...of an Academy Award.

A lot of people felt Serkis should have won for his portrayal of Gollum, but he puts that performance to shame with his turn as the not-so-poker faced leader of the apes, Caesar.

It's the understated emotion that really bubbles to the surface in Serkis' depiction of the reluctant but always resolute Caesar.

It's not easy to give a performance through a CGI ape and convey to the audience through vocal intonations and an extremely limited speaking script the hurt, the ambition, the hate, and the pain that Caesar feels, yet paired with an incredibly talented special effects team, Serkis manages to pull it off.

I suppose I can't give all the credit to them, because the script for this film is way above par. It works on so many different levels, and it's really quite something because I just got done watching Godzilla vs Kong, and oh boy is there such a stark difference in screenplay quality between the two films.

All while watching War For The Planet of the Apes I was thinking to myself "Why couldn't the Transformers get this sort of on-screen characterization and treatment?" The Hollywood excuse is always "No one wants to see robots fighting for two hours!" and yet that's always the best and only parts worth watching when it comes to the Transformer films.

Here, however, director Matt Reeves flipped the script (I suppose you could say literally) by putting the focus on the CGI apes instead of the humans. The entire story is about Caesar -- everyone else plays second fiddle to Caesar.

It basically proves that you can make a quality, character-driven film without tacking on some ridiculous human sub-plots just to pad out the time or tie together action scenes.

In this particular case War For The Planet Of The Apes is probably misnomer given that this is not an action film. Yes, there are action scenes, but this is all character drama, with a few action set pieces to payoff the trilogy.

I thought the original Dawn of the Planet Of The Apes was an okay film, nothing too memorable. I didn't care all that much for Rise of the Planet of the Apes. However, I have to say that I adore War For The Planet Of The Apes.

The difference boils down to bringing the emotion out of the leads (who are all CGI apes), giving the main antagonist a complex and multi-dimensional approach to his self-proclaimed "purpose" and a few twists you likely won't see coming.

I can understand why a lot of people may not like the film because it's methodically filmed and paced. This isn't The Fast & The Furious, and if you go in expecting more "War" rather than "Planet of the Apes" then I suppose you'll be sorely disappointed.

However, if you're looking for a movie that's actually really well directed, better written than it has any reason to be, and a lot more emotionally driven than most other Oscar-bait dramas, then you'll definitely enjoy War For The Planet Of The Apes.

And it still irks me that Serkis wasn't even nominated for an Oscar for his performance. I didn't bother checking to see who won best actor for 2017, but I'm finding it hard to believe anyone turned in a more layered, heartfelt, and multi-dimensional performance than Serkis did with Caesar.

War for the Planet of the Apes is as near a perfect film as you'll ever get. It manages to surpass Dawn in just about every aspect, which is a huge achievement. The pacing is perfect, the score is phenomenal, and the CGI is out of this world. You can't give the special effects team enough credit, what they've done for this film is truly magnificent. Andy Serkis is oustanding as Caesar and I'm fully aboard the Oscar train! Woody Harrelson plays a great villain and is owner of the one and only expositional scene in the film. It truly is a masterpiece and caps off the trilogy like I never thought possible. A remarkable film.

This a great movie. Down of the planet of the apes is better. But still this movie has great acting. It also has a great story line. 7.5 is underrating this movie I give it 9 out of 10.

A quick look at the bad reviews shows that most of them were written around the same time, mid July 2017 and most all of them are 1 star ratings, an obvious attack on the movie makers and nothing to do with the quality of the film. I urge you to ignore these fake reviews and read instead those written after the summer of 2017!

War (as arguably miss-titled as it is) is once again on top of its game, with a more intense story, the effects looking better than ever, some genuine surprises and shocking moments, and the A-game acting. This trilogy has truly ended on a high note