War for the Planet of the Apes

Downer films - at least ones costing north of $150m - are in short supply these days. With the shambolic state of the world of late, it could be argued that's no bad thing; no-one wants to be emotionally pummelled by a film only to walk out into the shit sandwich of actual reality. But sometimes, when the allegories run so close to home that a story takes on more meaning than perhaps its creators originally envisaged, a film fizzing with nihlism and fatalism becomes wholly necessary. I'm going on record (for now at least) to say that War for the Planet of the Apes is my film of the year - a downer film for the ages perhaps, but one that had me enthralled and exhilarated from the first frame to the last.

In a handy recap for anyone not quite up to speed with the current Apes series, the film opens with brief plot outlines of what's already happened to get us where we are. Caesar, an ape who's intellect was greatly enhanced due to his owner's experimentation with a cure for Alzheimer's (experimentation which led to the outbreak of so-called 'simian flu', all but wiping out the human race) leads his species in an ongoing struggle between apes and humans - a battle started by Koba, a fellow ape experimentee who's lust for war ultimately led to his death at the hands of Caesar.

While Caesar wants nothing more than for apes and humans to live separately and in peace, the surviving humans fear the apes will become the dominant species and "treat humans as their cattle" - or so says Colonel McCullough, played with typical Southern charm/menace (delete as appropriate) by Woody Harrelson. Far from being a one-dimensional villain, McCullough has sound reason and logic behind his aggressive sentiments, very much a Joker to Caesar's Batman (I'm not sure that metaphor works, but I'm standing by it).

McCullough has militarised a faction of remaining humans who are immune to the simian flu, caging up apes and creating what amounts to a concentration camp, complete with makeshift ape crucifixes (or rather 'scarecrows', for anyone familiar with the 1968 original) and a nice line in underground tunnels that would be a perfect escape route for the apes he's rounded up. Surely not...

It's this layering of emotionally-complex characters and allegorical brutality that gives War... a level of depth and nuance that is sorely lacking from too many franchise films these days. Director Matt Reeves - having already proved he could steer the franchise in a daring direction with the previous sequel - doesn't attempt to box-tick what he thinks an audience wants. It feels far more personal than any tent-pole studio film has any right to. However the real surprise lies in the structure. Far from being the war movie the title suggests, War... takes a slow-burn approach to what is essentially a riff on The Great Escape via Apocalypse Now, but with moments of unswerving horror that would struggle to pass censors if it wasn't for the fact it's CGI apes getting whipped and executed, not humans.

Not content with stripping back the action to a bare minimum and focusing on character development (I know, a good script - who'd have thought it?!), War... has great fun introducing new folk into the mix - namely the unbearably cute Bad Ape (a note-perfect Steve Zahn) who brings some subtle but much-needed comic relief to proceedings; and Nova, a mute young girl who's name - like the crucifixes - calls back to the 1968 original without feeling crowbarred (how she gets her name is one of the film's myriad touching moments).

While War... feels like a the end of a trilogy, more often than not these things never are. You could quite easily remake the original from this juncture (admittedly with the help of a two-thousand year fast-forward button) and continue rebooting apace. But Reeves has already suggested there's more stories to tell, not least with the introduction of Bad Ape, who's inclusion in the narrative hints at a wider ape evolution that we as viewers haven't yet been privy to. If further films are of this quality - downers though they may be - consider me signed up for the lot.