"Planet of the Apes" remake puts franchise back on track

If the prospect of another journey to the Planet of the Apes holds as much appeal for you as a rotten banana, you're not alone.

Tim Burton's flung-poo 2001 remake squandered a lot of the goodwill amassed by the original franchise which, between the years of 1968 and 1975, yielded five movies, a live-action TV series, and a Saturday morning cartoon.

"Rise of the Planet of the Apes" is everything Burton's movie wasn't -- smart, exciting and thought-provoking, while operating in the realm of the movies' great misunderstood monsters.

Like King Kong and Godzilla before him, audiences will fear the intelligent ape Caesar (played brilliantly via motion-capture animation by Andy Serkis) while also empathizing with his plight.

The film stars James Franco as Will Rodman, a genetics researcher testing a new drug on apes that repairs neural pathways and could potentially cure Alzheimer's. It's a personal crusade for Will, whose father Charles -- played by John Lithgow -- suffers from the disease.

The drug seems to be working on a lab ape known as "Bright Eyes" (that's what the intelligent apes called Charlton Heston in the original movie, and it's one of about a dozen shout-outs to the original "Apes" films here), but when she goes on a rampage, drug company exec Jacobs (David Oyelowo) shuts down the program.

Bright Eyes didn't freak out because of the drug, however; she was merely protecting her baby, the one that Will takes home, raises on his own, and names Caesar. And while Caesar has benefited from his mother's exposure to the drug, Will secretly brings the experimental formula home and start giving it to Charles, who seems to be improving.

As Caesar gets older, Will's girlfriend Caroline (Freida Pinto, playing a zoo vet so underwritten that Rosario Dawson's character in "Zookeeper" feels like Dr. Jane Goodall by comparison) warns him that the ape will become strong and violent.

And when a pushy next-door neighbor gets into an altercation with a now-relapsing Charles, Caesar lashes out and winds up getting incarcerated in a primate facility where he learns the law of the jungle -- and figures out a way to build an army against the cruel humans.

Plot-wise, "Rise" most resembles "Conquest of the Planet of the Apes," in which talking ape Caesar leads his enslaved brothers in a revolt. But while that film was more of a political parable, this new one marries questions about the excesses of genetics research with a tense and suspenseful prison-break story. (The latter mirrors director Rupert Wyatt's exceptional previous film, "The Escapist.")

So many contemporary movies have a hard time balancing two things at once -- "The Change-Up" treats gross-out gags and midlife romance like they were walking and chewing gum -- that it's a real pleasure to watch "Rise of the Planet of the Apes" unfold, skillfully encompassing sci-fi, action, suspense, and the Will/Caesar relationship, which falls somewhere between parent/child and boy-and-his-dog.

Franco's not the first actor you'd think of for this kind of movie, but he plays it straightforwardly, handling the role's emotional moments and its streams of science-babble with ease. He also knows that, billing aside, this is Serkis' show all the way.

Cox, who spear-headed the prison break in "The Escapist," flips the script by playing the warden of the monkey jail, and if Tom Felton wanted to avoid post-"Harry Potter" typecasting after a decade of playing Draco Malfoy, then perhaps playing Cox's sadistic, chimp-taunting son wasn't the way to do it.

With its army of apes, chimpanzees, orangutans, and gorillas, "Rise" bites off a lot, effects-wise, but the movie delivers some of the best motion-capture animation since "Avatar." Nobody gives a performance with ping-pong balls on his face like Andy Serkis, as he previously proved in "King Kong" and the "Lord of the Rings" movies, and here he makes Caesar vulnerable, conflicted, loving, and ultimately terrifying.

It's not the kind of acting that wins awards, but Serkis' work here is mesmerizing. (Granted, I miss the old-school methods, where Kim Hunter and Roddy McDowall were buried in layers and layers of latex to play the simian stars, but when the CG is this good, it's hard to complain.)

While there are some minor nits to be picked here -- Pinto's barely-there character, a rare slackening of the pace in the build-up to the big finale, a few too many inside jokes for fans of the original "Apes" series" -- "Rise of the Planet of the Apes" feels like a genuine summer surprise.

Who would think that the dog days of August would give us one of the most genuinely appealing big-studio tentpole movies of the year?

Shia Labeouf, Megan Fox hit the back seat for ‘Transformers’

Actor Shia Labeouf was making headlines on Tuesday — only hours before his new movie “Transformers: Dark of the Moon” premiered in theaters — with an interview published in Details magazine in which he claims that he and former “Transformers” co-star Megan Fox shared some intimate moments on the set of the films. It makes us wonder what exactly took place in the back seats of those shape-shifting “Transformers” cars.

The Details profile says its reporter asked LaBeouf if he had “hooked up” with the 25 year-old sex symbol, and the actor nodded in the affirmative. “Look, you’re on the set for six months with someone who’s rooting to be attracted to you and you’re rooting to be attracted to them,” LaBeouf told the magazine. “I never understood the separation of work and life in that situation. But the time I spent with Megan was our own thing, and I think you can see the chemistry on-screen,” he said.

The 25 year-old LaBeouf was asked by Details if, at the time he and Fox were together, she was in a relationship with then boyfriend and now husband Brian Austin Green. “I don’t know,” LaBeouf said, repeating the answer several times according to the magazine. A representative for Fox declined comment.

Fox starred in the 2007 “Transformers” and the 2009 sequel “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen,” but she was dropped from the franchise for the third film. “Dark of the Moon,” in the latest installment Fox has been replaced with former lingerie model Rosie Huntington-Whiteley. We wonder what stories the actor might cook up, if any, about hooking up with her four years from now on, say, “Transformers 5″.

Michelle Williams in "Marilyn" film gets NY debut

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - "My Week with Marilyn," starring Oscar-nominated actress Michelle Williams as 1950s sex symbol Marilyn Monroe, will see its world premiere at the New York Film Festival in October, organizers said on Thursday.

Directed by Simon Curtis, the film is based on a week that British writer Colin Clark worked as an assistant with Monroe while she was filming "The Prince and the Showgirl" in the United Kingdom in the early summer of 1956.

That film featured Monroe working opposite Sir Laurence Oliver and was shot when Monroe was on a honeymoon with her husband, playwright Arthur Miller. When he left England, Clark was assigned to introduce Monroe to British life.

"My Week with Marilyn" is based on a diary Clark kept, excerpts of which were published in two books in 1995 and 2000. Along with Williams, the movie also stars Kenneth Branagh as Olivier, Dougray Scott as Miller and Dame Judi Dench.

"After seeing Marilyn Monroe so often portrayed in films as a caricature, it is a pleasure to see this complex personality and unique on-screen presence portrayed so well by such a talented actress as Michelle Williams," said Richard Pena, program director for The Film Society of Lincoln Center, which backs the festival.

The film, which will look to compete in Hollywood's Oscar race this upcoming season, will get its New York Film Festival premiere on October 9 and be released in theaters on November 4.

Williams has been nominated twice for Oscars for her work in "Brokeback Mountain" and "Blue Valentine," but she has never won the world's top film honor.

"Captain America" shoots down "Harry Potter"

(Reuters) - Superhero movie "Captain America: The First Avenger" triumphed at the U.S. and Canadian box offices with $65.8 million in weekend ticket sales as the magic faded from the final "Harry Potter" film's record-breaking debut.

The strong opening for "Captain America" topped expectations in its battle against the hugely successful "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2," which saw its massive opening-weekend audience from last week shrink by 72 percent.

The final installment in the popular "Potter" series took in $48.1 million over its second weekend in domestic (U.S. and Canadian) theaters, plus $121.3 million internationally, distributor Warner Bros. said on Sunday.

Romantic comedy "Friends with Benefits" starring Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis, took the No. 3 spot over three days with $18.5 million domestically, a solid start for a film that cost about $34 million to produce, according to Sony Pictures studio.

"Captain America" drew a 64 percent male audience to the film set in the 1940s, about a scrawny, bullied orphan transformed into a muscular superhero thanks to a serum developed by the government. He is the latest Marvel comic book character to hit the big screen before the superheroes join forces in next year's film "The Avengers."

The success against the "Harry Potter" finale "was well beyond what anybody was expecting," said Don Harris, executive vice president of distribution for Paramount Pictures, which released "Captain America." The film drew positive reviews and "had a retro look to it" that appealed to moviegoers even after a summer filled with superhero flicks, he said.

For the eighth and final "Harry Potter" movie in the series about a British boy wizard battling against evil, sales dropped sharply, as expected, after avid fans had rushed to see the movie when it debuted. The film broke records around the world including best opening weekend ever in the domestic and international markets.

The film's total ticket sales now stand at $274.2 million in domestic theaters and $560.4 million internationally, for a combined total of $834.6 million.

Other top films for the weekend were big-budget Hollywood film "Transformers: Dark of the Moon" at No. 4 with $12 million, and adult-oriented comedy "Horrible Bosses" at No. 5 with $11.7 million.

"Captain America" and "Transformers: Dark of the Moon" were released by Paramount Pictures, a unit of Viacom Inc. Warner Bros., a unit of Time Warner Inc, distributed "Deathly Hallows - Part 2" and "Horrible Bosses." "Friends with Benefits" is from Screen Gems, a unit of Sony Corp.