Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		5.0
Audio		5.0
Extras		4.0
Overall		4.0

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes 4K Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman August 27, 2024

When you get right down to it, has there ever been a film less likely to engender not one but two long lived franchises than the original Planet of the Apes? That brilliant 1968 film had the benefit of a bristling and smartly humorous screenplay by Rod Serling (adapting a rather interesting and in some ways quite different source novel by Pierre Boulle of The Bridge on the River Kwai fame), one which in rather impeccable Serling style came replete with a big heaping dose of irony in the closing moments. But that very ending seemed to be rather "closed", in that it brought what really was another morality tale from Serling full circle (in more ways than one), with no obvious way for a sequel (or sequels) to follow. Aside and apart from more salient issues like an ability to offer a continuing narrative, there's the sidebar aspect of the now probably more observable quaintness of the special effects of the first film and its immediately subsequent outings that may admittedly have been state of the art (and Academy Award winning) at the time, but may have lead even enthralled viewers back in the day to whisper to some imagined individual on the creative staff, "Um, you do realize their mouths aren't moving, don't you?" By the time that Tim Burton got around to remaking Planet of the Apes in 2001, special effects wizardry had obviously, well (franchise pun forthcoming), evolved, and perhaps kind of interestingly, the surplus of sequels to the original film, follow ups which perhaps went to increasingly frantic efforts to keep the series alive, may have actually redounded to the benefit of a rebirth, since all sorts of nooks and crannies of that original series could be interpolated and/or explored in more depth, though not always with complete adherence to the original series' presentations.

One of the kind of darkly humorous things about the "first" series of Planet of the Apes films is how the second outing, Beneath the Planet of the Apes, arguably provided even more of an "unfollowable" denouement than the first film, to the point that the subsequent sequels had to do just a bit of tinkering with the timeframe in order to keep things alive. That struggle to develop a story that had had not one, but two, seemingly "final" outcomes courtesy of its first two installments, ultimately led to the creation of the character of Caesar, played by Roddy McDowall. Now admittedly the reboot's Caesar (Andy Serkis) was not exactly the same character, though he was still a highly evolved leader and fearless chimpanzee commanding officer. The whole time travelling or at least multiple timeframes approach suffused the Caesar focused sequels of the reboot series, including Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes and War for the Planet of the Apes.

Suffice it to say that the ending of War for the Planet of the Apes was another kind of ending as well, which may have necessitated yet another "now what do we do?" question from those tasked with carrying on the series. The answer, after a brief tethering segue to War for the Planet of the Apes, is to utilize the (again in more ways than one) "time" honored technique that both the original series and the reboot series have employed, namely shifting when everything is taking place. Somewhat hilariously, then, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, despite ostensibly moving things ahead several generations, in some ways simply gets the whole convoluted thing back to where it began, with highly evolved apes dealing with feral humans, even if some of that species is "evolved" in terms of being able to speak.

Kind of interestingly in that regard, it takes a while for a "formal" introduction of a human being (after a few fleeting glances and/or interactions), and per my above comment about the reboots "revisiting" the first series, albeit in sometimes tweaked ways, the focal human here turns out to be a young woman the apes name Nova, an obvious play on the character played by Linda Harrison in the first two films (with a later cameo that some may recall), even if her "real" name is Mae (Freya Allan). While the original Caesar is mostly the stuff of legend and lore in this story, and the focal chimpanzee has a name probably suspiciously similar to Nova's, Noa (Owen Teague). There is a Caesar in this tale, a villainous lout named Proximus Caesar (Kevin Durand), who has adopted the original Caesar's philosophy into a, well, tool to achieve his own ends.

The problem with a series (and you can read "series" as either singular or plural, I guess) like this is most of the "surprises" that any new effort might offer might have at least been hinted at in previous outings, and that's probably once again the case here, as much as the screenplay may attempt to misdirect and/or divert. There's as much internecine drama between various ape species here as there actually is between apes and humans (which itself may recall some films from the first series), and perhaps comically given all of the above mentioned "absolutely conclusive" finales that would seem to preclude any sequel, this one is obviously set up for whatever comes next, which looks like it might be yet another round of skirmishes between intelligent apes and intelligent humans.

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes 4K Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Note: Screenshots are sourced from 20th Century Studios' Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes 1080 release. The 1080 disc in this set does not offer the feature film, other than in the split screen Inside the Lens supplement.

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes is presented in 4K UHD courtesy of 20th Century Studios and Disney / Buena Vista with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.39:1. I've often been on record stating I'm not always complete fond of Arri Alexa captures, but this is a stunning exception to that self created rule, one that according to the IMDb had a 4K DI. (Some scenes were evidently captured with a BlackMagic, according to the IMDb.) There's a frankly almost Avatar-esque ambience to the forested scenes in particular, and not necessarily just due to the prevalence of CGI, but take it as a compliment, one way or the other. Detail levels are frankly staggering at times, even in relatively wide shots, where you might feel you'd be able to pause a frame and individually count leaves on a tree or hairs on a chimp's body. What I'm assuming were actual practical props and costumes also offer excellent fine detail levels throughout. As with some of the previous installments in the reboot, there's quite a bit of minimally lit footage, and this disc's HDR can help elucidate at least some shadow definition that isn't quite as discernable in the 1080 version. The palette is lustrous, though frankly I wouldn't argue materially changed from the 1080 version, simply more vibrant looking. As with so many 4K outings, digital grain may be slightly less subliminal looking in this version when compared to the 1080, but I found the general appearance of that element here to not offer any issues.

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes 4K Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes features a beautifully immersive Dolby Atmos track, one that takes all the strengths of the DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 track on the simultaneously released 1080 disc (why do they do that, anyway?) and then adds just a little more "oomph" (a technical term) at times. You can hear clear engagement of the Atmos speakers in a glut of ambient environmental effects, and since the bulk of the film takes place outside, or at least away from what might typically be called civilization, all of the surround channels can buzz with background forest or seaside noises. The use of falcons throughout also provides some clear overhead activity. John Paesano's score is kind of elegiac and string drenched at times, and sounds great, with a nicely spacious presentation (it's kind of funny to see "thematic elements" by Jerry Goldsmith credited, since Goldsmith's score was so famously atonal and percussive, with nary a "theme" to be heard). Dialogue is rendered cleanly and clearly throughout. Optional subtitles in several languages are available.

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes 4K Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

The 4K disc in this package has no supplementary material. I may want to quibble with the assertion that the 1080 Blu-ray disc in this set provides another cut of the film with the Inside the Lens supplement, since what's offered is in reality a picture in picture or least picture next to picture outing that provides "making of" information as the film plays. And in fact the text card before that supplement overtly states "the following is a full length split screen comparison between the final cut of the film and a version with unfinished VFX".

• Inside the Lens: The Raw Cut (HD; 2:24:27) also features an optional commentary by Wes Ball, Dan Zimmerman and Erik Winquist.


• Inside the Forbidden Zone: Making Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes (HD; 23:25) is a decent EPK with some good production information including some training regimens, and quite a bit of candid footage.


• Deleted Scenes / Extended Scenes with Optional Commentary by Wes Ball (HD; 32:15)

Additionally a digital copy is included and packaging features a slipcover.

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes 4K Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

You might be able to sense just a bit of lethargy or alternatively desperation to keep this franchise alive, but Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes succeeds more often than not in my estimation. The film is both visually and aurally glorious, and there are some really superb characters here helping to keep interest. Technical merits are first rate, and the supplements very enjoyable. Recommended.