Shakespearean Simians
Still from Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014)
Shakespeare’s King plays are some of the most well-known tales of Western Civilization, even better known than the real kings that inspired them. These are stories of power, family, and betrayal. In my opinion, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes is a story worthy of comparison to Richard III and Macbeth. A Sci-fi movie on the realistic, near-future side of the spectrum, it also speaks to our modern anxieties of pandemics and societal collapse.
The film begins with an exposition voice over, explaining how after the events and the ape’s escape from the lab in Rise of the Planet of the Apes (an inferior film which is not required viewing to enjoy “Dawn”), a “Simian Flu” spread across the globe, devastating the global population. Unable to recover from the damage the pandemic caused, society fell as people turned against each other, everyone fending for themselves. We pick up 10 years later in 2026, human society is fractured and disconnected without widespread electricity and radio networks.
Meanwhile, the apes have made a home for themselves in the Red Wood forest outside of San Francisco. Caesar, along with his lieutenants Maurice, Rocket, and Koba, lead the small but thriving community. In a chance encounter with a human from the remaining survivors in San Francisco, Rocket’s son is shot and killed. The other apes arrive, forcing the humans to retreat. Koba and Caesar’s schism over the humans is the central conflict of the Shakespearean-level drama. Koba bears the scars, both physical and internal, from the human scientist’s experiments on him before the fall. Caesar was the prize ape of the lab and was basically a pet to the lead scientist. Their new Ape society has three laws: “Ape not kill ape,” “Ape together strong,” and “Knowledge is power.” By the end of the movie, Caesar will be forced to break that first law.
The humans need to fix the old hydroelectric dam in the forest where the apes live so that the city can have electricity again and maybe even contact other surviving communities of humans. Koba, of course is distrusting while Caesar cautiously allows them to do their work. Koba sneaks into the humans’ commune and discovered they have a stockpile of military weapons. Upon returning to tell Caesar, he is dismissed for threatening the humans. So Koba schemes to assassinate Caesar with a gun, framing the humans and sparking a massacre of their community of survivors. He successfully pulls this off, and leads the apes, armed with guns, on a rampage through the streets of San Francisco. But Caesar is not really dead, having fallen into a river and floated downstream. The humans who had been working on the dam save him just in time for him to confront and kill Koba. However, it all happens too late, the damage has been done and the war with the humans has started, setting up the third film in the trilogy.
This story of betrayal, revenge, and the struggle for power is Shakespearean. It has the depth of emotion, the layered motives, and the shifting of allegiances. To further this point, Caesar’s son, Blue Eyes, is made to doubt his father’s allegiances when he decides to trust the humans. He ultimately sides with Koba, before realizing the error in his ways after witnessing Koba’s vengeful violence and returning to his father’s side. The humans also have their own dramas going on, but they are secondary to the Caesar and Koba’s conflict.
It’s also fascinating witnessing the ape society starting from scratch and using the sign language and writing they learned from the humans to start a better society than the one they were caged by. And in making this better society, they have nearly forgotten their fears and anxieties with humans, until they’re forced to confront them once again.
There will always be someone who thinks they can run a nation better than the person in power, but heavy is the head and it takes great patience and wisdom to lead others. And yet Koba’s rhetoric that appeals to the vengeful anger of his fellow apes (which he partially manipulated them into) works in raising an army’s worth to attack the humans. In this Caesar is forced to realize that peace does not come without a cost, especially when multiple disparate parties/species are involved.
I love this film. It scratches that itch of drama and intrigue that Shakespeare mastered with a twinge of speculative sci-fi. Caesar’s saga is an incredibly human tale and Andy Serkis’s performance is stoic perfection. Koba’s tragic grudge and betrayal of Caesar makes for a deliciously complex villain that you can’t help but feel sorry for. Not to mention the visual effects. All the apes in almost every shot look like they’re physically there and their eyes are so human. It almost makes you think they’re in ape suits like the old films. If any of this sounds appeals to you, I fully recommend Dawn of the Planet of the Apes and its follow-up War for the Planet of the Apes.
