The Rise of the Planet of the Apes - Or better titled Escape of the Apes

 Mark's Review:

The Escape of the Apes: The Prison Heist Movie Goes Sci-Fi

Rise of the Planet of the Apes is a clever film that understands that underneath all of its CGI wonder and Rod Serling heritage it is a prison heist film and a good one. Director Ruprett Wyatt, previously noted for the wonderful Brit prison heist film “the Escapist”, must have seen what the dozens of other Hollywood A-list directors missed when they passed on this project: it’s a great thriller. Like the original Planet of the Apes the allegory merely gilds the lily of a crackling good yarn.  However, this isn’t suggested that the film shortchanges ape film fans by forgoing shout outs to the series cinematic history: its chock full of them. It’s that just like the excellent CGI and nicely understated performances you may not notice while rooting for Caesar and his ape friends to flee for the redwoods before the greedy humans stumble their way into a global apocalypse.

These include:

The leader of the ape rebellion, Caesar (Andy Serkis) shares his name with the similar character, played by Roddy McDowell, from "Conquest of" and "Battle for the Planet of the Apes."

Charlton Heston makes a brief cameo, on a television screen at the ape sanctuary.

Caesar strikes up a friendship with an orangutan named Maurice -- an homage to actor Maurice Evans, who played the evil orangutan Dr. Zaius in the first "Planet of the Apes."

James Franco's Will Rodman takes his name from "Twilight Zone" creator and "Planet of the Apes" co-screenwriter Rod Serling, whose full first name was Rodman.

The media makes several background references to a spaceship named Icarus. A news report announces "Icarus Entering Mars Atmosphere" and a few scenes later, a copy of the San Francisco Chronicle reports that the same vessel was "Lost in Space." In the '68 "Apes," the Icarus is the ship that Taylor, Landon, and Dodge take to the year 3978; two movies later it's also the ship Cornelius, Zira (Kim Hunter), and Milo (Sal Mineo) take back to 1973.

Definitely not to be missed, I urge everyone to see this before we are all replaced by orangutans.

Review by our roving reporter Mark Tygart

Cowboys and Aliens - Review By Mark -

Cowboys and Aliens:  The Good, the Bad and the Weird

(With apologies to Sergio Leone)

I decided to write a review of a Hollywood blockbuster that I found myself liking both drunk and sober only to find that I had been hijacked by the smurfs. Yes those annoying little blue things that should have been fed to Barney the dinosaur years ago have escaped children’s television to haunt the local multiplex. This has dominated the press coverage for the poor film that linked with Hollywood’s eternal joy in somebody else’s failure seems to obscure the fact that this is a pretty decent popcorn flick, in fact a gift.

I like the film for several reasons. I liked that it was 2D. I liked Harrison Ford as a grumpy cattle baron reminding us all he can act. I liked Daniel Craig kicking ass in the Old West. I liked imaging Oliva Wilde if this had been a Showtime miniseries with actual nudity. I should stop here.

I liked the fact that it was a Western with aliens. A real large budgeted western with a decent budget A -list stars, expensive production values and script without a smurf in sight. Just aliens from ID4 that have managed to escape an Xbox 360 somewhere to menace our heroes.  We have finally arrived at the weird west, that most difficult of subgenres and it works. This film works because it is a part of that cinematic tradition of classic tropes and big skies to watch on the silver screen instead of an iPod.

It’s also a Science Fiction film about 30% of the time, but frankly outside of Daniel Craig’s cool arm gun (what I would have given to have that when I was twelve) this science fiction Alien homage (I’ll be kind) is less interesting than the Western. This is a film that loves its heroes and the villains are simply monster who want ….gold. Harrison Ford’s line when he finds this out is priceless. Of course this would be ridiculous until you stop to consider how much the history of the Americas has been shaped by monsters who want…gold.

It’s not a history lesson or anything really deep, it just an entertainment that wants to propose that human beings are pretty much alike and pretty decent when not being crushed by the economics of a intergalactic mining consortium. Go see it, its fun.

Review By our man in the field , Mark Tygart