Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes

Kingdom of the planet of the apes.

12, it’s funny. It’s 1989, and Batman, after increased pressure, particularly post-Gremlins, is the first film in the UK to be given a 12. Even then, it’s council to council. I phoned around. Streatham was a 15, and Wandsworth was a 15. You could only see it in the Warner West End as a 12. It was a big deal to my 13-year-old self. 

12a, aka, where it all went wrong. Spiderman was released within weeks. It was allowing under 12s into the cinema. Grumpy grown man Deb felt it was a big deal for all the wrong reasons; what are children doing here in HIS FILM? WHERE WERE THEY IN THE SECRET WARS. THEY CAN TAKE THEIR 50P AND FUCK OFF

Since then, I have had many issues. The most notable to me was the children crying and being pulled out of The Dark Knight. I never wanted to see it, but their dad did, and he took them. See also James Bond. My nephew is now 14 and was telling me about John Wick in thee theatre.

So, to see a franchise built on the definition of gritty reboot come in and swing for high fantasy tantamount to an avatar with fur was the weirdest sensation today.

On the one hand, its attempt to tie itself to the previous trilogy is through the teachings of Caesar, but frankly, this film has moved to the need for escapism and embraced the earth as a fantasy land. Weapon proficiencies abound with masks, electrickery in weapons, and mystic summonings of animals like 8th-level rangers. There is even a sense of books as spells, and the main orangutan, being a librarian, is in no way a conscience on a planet where most intelligent lifeforms can’t swim so that it could be a disc.

And it’s not that it’s not breathtaking; it’s a beautiful set of vistas. This evolved land of green and urban decay is becoming more vegetative and gripping. But Noah’s journey is squarely for youngsters. And when you take an adult sentiment of the original trilogy and try and write it for perceived youngsters, you write something for 

Children.

It’s too long for an adult attention span and too mild in its peril for teens. It’s relatively unthreatening, although dramatic, and it might as well be the lion king in its depiction of grief. The few nods to intergenerational trauma within the communities; what has been forgotten culturally or ignored is touched and thrown like a pebble on a pond. 

And by the end, nothing is revealed. It became hard towards that end to understand the geography of it all, making the only human for most of the film feel like she escaped the Hunger Games. And I wandered into an adjacent set. There were moments with proximous. I wanted Furiosa to turn up and add that sense of human apocalypse to the film’s grit.

So 12…no..it’s a hard one. I would take my niece. Maybe. I’m barely 11 and more appreciative of style then my teen boy nephew, aka spider man India!…but for a set-up, it’s lukewarm like a little bubble bath if they’re too big for IF this is the one for them. But for most teens. Stick on the marvels and leave this in the woods.