Cinepals - WAR FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES (2017) Reaction & Review!

Episode Date: April 29, 2024

Kristen & Michael continue their Planet of the Apes adventure with War for the Planet of the Apes, as Caesar leads his ape colony in a desperate battle against human forces, ultimately confronting his own inner demons in a quest for peace and survival.  This film stars: Andy Serkis (The Lord of the Rings series, King Kong & Andor), Woody Harrelson (Zombieland & True Detective), Steve Zahn (Dallas Buyers Club & Rescue Dawn), Karin Konoval (The X-Files & The Good Doctor), Terry Notary (The Hobbit series & Avengers: Infinity War), Amiah Miller (Lights Out & Anastasia), and Gabriel Chavarria (East Los High & Lowriders).   SOCIAL MEDIA: ~CINEPALS~ YouTube: @CinePals Insta: https://instagram.com/TheCinePals Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheCinePals   ~KRISTEN STEPHENSONPINO~ Instagram: @Kris10Kesp   ~MICHAEL~ Insta: @booseisloose 

Senna. Today, we are back. Ready to dive in with war for the planet of the eights. I am so nervous, I don't know what to expect, but we are here. Third installment, third installment, third installment. Let's go. No pot intended. Yeah, right.

Oh, my heart. We just lost our baby. We did. We did. We saw him from beginning. I know. Oh, my heart. Where are you supposed to go from here?

I don't know. I don't know what they're going to do in the next one. Like, I know theoretically the next one's like a time jump, probably. But like, where do you go from here? I don't want it. If Caesar's not in it, you don't want it. Maybe it's baby Caesar. Maybe it's his little son and his son has grown up.

Nope, I'm done with the dying. I'm done. I'm done with the dying. I'm done with the chaos, the ugliness. That one was heart-wrenching. It really caught me by surprise, because, like, war for the planet of the apes, I really thought there'd be a lot more, like, direct conflict between the humans and the apes. I really thought it was going to set up of, like, you know, there's, like, a siege on one side,

they're, like, sieging each other, and not the, like, A, the beginning, which felt very, like, fellowship of the ring sort of vibe, and then B, where they were, like, actually imprisoned. You know, I was misled by the title, but I think that made the whole adventure more, like, powerful because I wasn't, I didn't know what I was expecting. So it really, it really caught me by surprise at every turn, especially with that beginning. But, oh my gosh. Okay. I did not think the colonel, Mr. Woody, should have been in this because I see him always as like a loving, kind of comical character.

Oh, Woody Harrelson. Yeah. Okay. Okay. I'm like, how are you going to cast this man who is so loved and adored around the world to be the villain? Dude, this guy's comical. But this man, let me tell you, if he wanted to be a villain, he can definitely be a villain. He did really, really well.

And then I'm used to just seeing him in funny, like being a comical character. Right. And lovable. I feel like they gave him that shot to be like a villain step out of his realm. And he delivered. He ate. Oh, yeah. He ate.

He fed. He fed himself. I thought it might pull me out of the story. Oh, oh. way whether if Woody Harrelson's performance would pull you out of the story. Well, I'm glad, yeah, he really, really thrived in that role. And that whole monologue where he's talking to Caesar about, like, losing his own son and how it purified him, like, cuckoo bat shit crazy stuff, but he delivered it so well.

Like the coldness, the calculatedness that he delivered that line. Amazing. Like, you did not see him sweat an inch in that entire film until Caesar found him right at the I just realized. Of course, this freaking Andy dude plays Caesar's voice. This man's legend. Oh, Andy Circus. No wonder.

No wonder. I was like, I realized that and I was like, this guy's a freaking legend. No wonder we love Caesar. Yeah. Andy Circus is incredible. You want great mocap acting? Put Andy Circus on it. He's so good.

You know, from where we've started to where we're at with this franchise, Dave delivered and delivered and delivered and delivered. And delivered time and time And then over delivered I'm in awe of this Every single one of these films was a banger Like I don't think There was a week one week

There was not one week Not at all Film at all And I really loved how every single one of them Like it told different parts of the story But it was a very different movie You know like each one of them on their own Was incredible

And they had their own style and narrative And each one of them was a different theme That sounds silly because obviously each one of them is a different movie, duh. But sometimes when you get longstanding franchise movies or things like that, like it feels like the same thing. It feels like the same thing. Fast and Furious.

After a certain point, it's all the same. The cars, they do a car heist, it's explosive, it's action. They're all the same movie. It doesn't matter where you are in the franchise. This one, every single one of them individually is a standalone movie, even without the like context. I get what you're saying 100%. Each one of these is a good standalone movie. It is.

And then they add to the franchise as they go through. Yes. So good. I think each and every one of them has a special place in my heart. Mm-hmm. I'm a fan of the planet of the apes. I never thought those words would ever come on my mouth. Honestly, like, because I've heard of, I've heard of like,

I've heard of like, oh, yeah, a planet of the apes. So you hear it thrown around, but I've just zoned out because I don't know. I guess I thought it was something completely different than what it is. I'm sitting here going. I'm that fan. I will invest. I will invest. They're very, very good.

They're so good, though. You know what they're really good about? In each and every one of them, they're so good about bringing in both sides of the world of chaos to see the beauty in it. And I really do appreciate that and love that aspect of it because a lot of the times we don't get that. You know, there's times where every once in a while you'll get like a little hint of something and something or whatever. But then you're like, oh, okay, cool. But with this one, they challenge our characters each and every time. I love how they push it even more to make you feel some type of way and you question yourself.

But you're also in that battle of, I get both sides. Yeah. You know? And then you're kind of like, like the moment the colonel started telling his story, right? about his little boy. Even Caesar, you could sit there and see the pain in Caesar's eyes. Then he's like, you know, I think there was like some type of sympathy there. But at the same time, you know, he's also like, dude, you're a monster.

And I think that the thought, the thought of I would give anything to have my son and you to live me, took your son. And then the part that stood out was when he told him, he's like, yeah, here's the thing. Even though I was, you know, aiming at gone at my son. he still looked at me with love with love and I was like shot to the heart yeah that's a tough one

and it's like it's a really brilliant example of like the two ways you can come out of that situation you know losing your son and then losing yourself in the search of revenge which was the general and losing your son son and still maintaining your humanity and then you got that fight

what Caesar's arc was yes and then you get that fight Don't forget our, um, coba. Oh, yeah, Cobah. Coba, don't forget of Coba. Throw that, throw that in, you're right, you're right, you're right, you're right. And then you got, yeah, you've got Coba, which is like the hatred and over the wellspring of that darkness that Maurice was talking about, where you're like, I hate everybody and they're irredeemable. Yeah.

And so I think there's a lot of really, really great themes throughout this. And it's, I think the beauty of these films is it forces us to look at our humanity. Yeah. And I think I've talked about this the last couple of them. But like it really forces us to look at like the us versus them thing and like our humanity and what separates like the apes or this new ape culture from humans and are we better than them? Do we need to take back the earth? Is this the natural order of things? Can we coexist? Like there's a lot of really, really beautiful questions. And I think you're right. And over and over again, which I like. I was going to say. And I think you're right. Having that human aspect, that human element where you see both sides of it is really important. important for us to empathize to the film. Yeah. Because it's really easy to paint the apes in a good light, but it also makes us think more

if you paint the humans in a more sympathetic light as well. I will say in this one, the humans were much less sympathetic than the other ones. A hundred percent. Like, they didn't do quite as much as making us sympathetic for the humans except for Nova. Yes, Nova and her father. But in all of that, like I feel like it's interesting because this one, you don't feel so sympathetic like you said for the humans. Right.

What's interesting is you start kind of getting frustrated with our beloved Caesar. Mm-hmm. That's true. Because we want him so badly to stay true to his loving nature. And as we see him doing things he's 110% against, the craziest part was they made him do the ultimate mistake. Yeah. And taking Noah's father. That, they did.

That's a balsy move. I know. It's such a little thing. It's such a little thing, but you can tell that, like, there's a shift in who Caesar is when he takes out the guy. I felt like that was kind of a big deal. It was. I felt like it was a big deal because I feel like in that moment, he had just lost his son and his wife. And he just took away a little girl's father. Yeah. And the only thing she had, how heavy is that? I think that saves him, too. It does. The moment, it's like, if he'd taken out that guy and they'd moved on without knowing that he had a daughter, without knowing anything, Caesar, I think, would have continued to spiral into that darkness. But the fact that he had to continue facing what he'd done with Caesar and, not with what he'd done, what Caesar had done in the face of Nova and still having to face the goodness that is humanity in Nova, I think that went a long way to helping Caesar work to his redemption and realizing. that he needs to work for the greater good

not for revenge like Coba. And I think that's beautiful. And I think it's like a perfect little like encapsulation of the whole film that's like really a fast moment right at the beginning that I think's very beautiful. I wanted to see who's playing Cornelius.

It's a female. It's Cornelia. I'm like, but you're like, you're like, what? The little baby monkey. She did all the mocap. Oh, yeah. She did all the mocap for Cornelius.

I know she did. She's great. Wait, I wasn't looking for quarantine. You're looking for Maurice. I'm looking for Maurice. You will be surprised to know also a woman. It is a woman for Maurice. It is a woman.

My goodness! Lady, you hurt my heart. I know. Maurice was amazing. I love. And the visual effects got better with every film as technology does. But this one, they really knocked it out of the park with like the emotiveness of all the eight. The eyes, dude.

Those eyes. Maurice especially, his character was incredible with his ability to emote through his eyes and like understanding. and like understanding his facial expressions and things like that. Like huge kudos to the special effects and mocap teams because you could see everything. And I think that's a beautiful thing that like people don't necessarily talk about with these films is they are so beautiful. But so much of them lacks dialogue. So much of it is reliant on the facial expressions of the mocap actors, the facial expression of the CGI apes. And there is so much emotion that is gained and told through those scenes where there is no dialogue or minimum minimal.

dialogue. Yeah. Even some of the sign language scenes, like the sign language isn't the important part. Half the time it's out of frame. But the facial expressions and the looks on all of the ape character's faces really tell the story and are like absolutely what make this film as phenomenal as it is, or as heart-wrenching as it is. Because you can see the emotion on those characters. And it would be really easy to lose that if done wrong. Yeah. So the fact that It's, it's so focused on and it's done so well is really like the, the true, I think, core of what makes these movies great. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. Speechless. Speechless. A hundred percent. You guys let us know your thoughts. And if you haven't done so already, please hit the subscribe button, bell icons, all notifications.

And if you've never upvoted any of these videos, this is the one to do it, all three. All three of them. This is the time to do it. If you've already done so, thank you so much for all your love and support. I'm Kristen, Stefan Zimino. I'm Michael Boose. And we love you, and we're out. Bye.