I’m sorry to say that I have only seen bits and pieces of the original “Planet of the Apes” with Charlton Heston, which means that any subtle references in this film probably went unnoticed by me. I’m also ashamed to say that I have seen the Wahlberg remake more than just a couple of times. So, given the events of both those versions, it really shouldn’t have come as much of a surprise to anyone that prequel would be made and set in present day. And, as far as prequels go, I have to say that “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” is a damn good one.

Set in present-day San Francisco, “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” revolves around Will Rodman (played by James Franco), a neurologist working on a cure for Alzheimer’s disease at the pharmaceutical company “Gen-Sys.” We find out very quickly that Will has been working for five years to perfect his cure (called “ALZ-112”) because he seeks to cure his father of the disease; and it looks as if he may have done so with a monkey he and other scientists call “Chimp 9/Bright Eyes.”

However, when it comes time to get approval for human trials, something goes wrong; “Bright Eyes” becomes inexplicably hostile, breaks free of her cage and ends up getting killed after attacking several scientists. When Will’s boss – believing that the hostility exhibited by “Bright Eyes” was a side effect of the drug – calls to have all other “contaminated” champs put down, Rodman discovers that “Chimp 9” has become a mother and her aggression was only her way of protecting her new-born chimp.

So, in order to save this baby chimp, Will decides to take it home with him until he can at least find something more suitable to do with him. But, after a little while, Will notices some peculiarities in the chimp, he realizes that the effects of “ALZ-112” may have been passed on from the mother. With this knowledge, Will decides to keep the monkey, which he names “Caesar.”

Fast forward eight years: Using his father as a guinea pig, Will has convinced the higher-ups at “Gen-Sys” to go back to work on developing a more powerful strain of the drug “ALZ-112” and testing it on chimps once again. Caesar, who has now grown to the size of a normal adult human, is taken away from Will and put into a habitat because of several “misunderstandings” that have occurred between him and Will’s next door neighbor. Both of these events directly set the stage for the ape uprising promised by the film’s title.

I’d like to make some comments on the human cast of this movie, but, for the life of me, I just don’t give a shit about them. For me, the best parts of the film were those that contained Andy Serkis’ Caesar or the other apes, and had absolutely nothing to do with the human-driven storyline. (I will say that I found it quite amusing that, after spending 10 years as the nemesis/bullying wizard Draco Malfoy, the first role that Tom Felton lands is a character who works at a primate habitat…which is owned by his FATHER…where he BULLIES Caesar and the other monkeys. I swear, during Caesar’s big revolt and subsequent escape from the habitat, I kept waiting for him to yell out “Wait till my father hears about this!”)

Not only does Serkis take one more step toward cementing himself as one of the foremost motion-capture artists today, he does so by bringing so much emotion to the CG Caesar, that I couldn’t help myself from rooting for the apes rather than the humans. Hell, after watching how cruelly almost every human treated Caesar and the other apes, I found myself thinking: “Hail Caesar! Yeah. Kill those asshole humans!” But that’s not what Caesar is looking for. Much like a merciful general, Caesar demonstrates that he only wishes for the liberation of the apes, rather than the extinction of humans.

In the final moments of the film, Will finds Caesar and his army of apes in the forest and begs Caesar to “come home.” It’s clear that this plea causes Caesar to contemplate whether to go with the only human who has been kind to him and never treated him badly, or continue to lead his “troops” onward to their liberation, as well as their ultimate domination of the human race. I don’t want to give anything away but let me just say that Caesar makes his decision in a way that is very dramatic and surprising for Will.

Bottom line is this: “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” has action, comedy, drama and just about anything else you could want from a summer movie. This versatility – as well as the overall execution of the film – makes it (EASILY) one of the best movies that I have seen all summer – maybe even all year.