Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. Fox held their big CinemaCon presentation this morning where they debuted a ton of footage. Among the best stuff was the trailer and extended scene they showed from Matt Reeves' War for the Planet of the Apes. Sadly, you can't see the full 3 or 4 minute scene, but you can see the epic, sweet, badass trailer and you have little ol' me here to tell you what you missed, so double win!
Let's watch the trailer first and then I'll be back to discuss the footage.
Now you've seen some of the footage in the above trailer. I'll make note of what's what as I go.
The footage opened with Caesar, Maurice, Rocket and a gorilla (whose name I don't know and I feel really ashamed to admit that) on top of a rusty water tower-looking thing overlooking a snowy, tree-lined mountainside.
Caesar speaks, the others sign. And it's worth noting that Caesar's speech is more relaxed and without accent. As the movies progress he speaks more and more like an average human and that's really exciting to me. I love that they're taking the time with this over multiple movies, showing the growth of the apes' intelligence.
Maurice signs "Where did the soldier go?" Caesar responds: "Hunter said they were going to a border." They're obviously looking for someone.
Below them is a young blonde girl on one of their horses. Unseen by her a figure in a Thing-like furry-hooded parka sneaks up. We don't see his face, but the figure starts to rummage through one of the horse's packs. He finds some binoculars and then a shotgun.
It's not long before he's spotted by the gorilla who roars out. Maurice jumps down to protect the girl and the intruder jumps on a white horse and speeds off. Our group of apes gives chase. They speed through the snowy trees, the hooded figure firing the shotgun at his pursuers.
They pass a long-broken down ski lift and end up at a demolished lodge. The interior is beautiful. Icicles hang down from the ceiling, everything is powdered with snow. You see it briefly in the trailer as Caesar and his group enter, guns up.
They slowly scan the room, settling on a giant stone fireplace. It's black as night in there and Caesar focuses on it, approaches with shotgun raised. He stops and stares into the blackness for a beat then loudly cocks the shotgun.
Immediately the stolen shotgun is thrown out and lands at his feet, followed by the binoculars. The hooded figure, hunched over and hands raised slowly exits. He looks up, lowers his hood and it's an ape. He speaks.
"Bad ape. Bad ape," gesturing to himself.
Caesar's group is astounded. This is the first talking ape they've ever seen that isn't part of their group. Rocket and the Gorilla sign stuff like "Who are you? What are you doing here." The new ape doesn't understand sign language.
This ape is Steve Zahn's character, who I'm 90% sure is named Nova. You see him in the trailer:
As Caesar talks to this new ape, Maurice and the young girl cautiously enter. Zahn makes a quick move and Rocket hoots, angry, pointing his gun at him. He slowly takes off his parka and says "Cold... Cold...", pointing to the girl. He gives the shivering girl his jacket.
Turns out this ape saw the girl and thought he was stealing from humans. Caesar asks him how long he's been here. "Long time. Long, long time." Then he gets excited and grabs a crocodile toy, showing it proudly to Caesar. On the stomach is stamped Sierra Zoo.
"Home. Old home." Caesar asks if there are any more like him and Zahn ape says all the other apes are dead. Then that bit from the trailer "Human get sick, ape gets smart, then human killed ape. But not me. Not me. I run."
Caesar wants to know how he learned to speak. "Listened to human." Then immitates a human: "Bad ape. Bad ape." The girl picks up a trinket and the ape quickly takes it from her. "Not touch. That mine."
He gets food for the group, which is rations stamped with California Border Patrol. Caesar suddenly very interested in this. Border. This is where the soldiers were going. He asks his new friend where he got this food packet.
"Bad place. Human zoo. Zoo for sick human. Big walls. Bad human. Kill. All dead now, for a long time."
The Zahn ape gets very concerned when Caesar asks him to take them to this place. "No, very far. Very dangerous. Safe here. You stay. Eat. Rest. Stay here with me. Here..." he gives the girl back the trinket she picked up earlier. "She keep!"
The trinket is a Chevy Nova insignia, which is why I think his name is Nova, which I kind of remember from the set visit way back when.
That was the footage. The effects were mindblowing, character work outstanding and photography was stunning. These movies keep getting better and better and I have such high hopes for this next outing.
-Eric Vespe
”Quint”
quint@aintitcool.com
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