As Caesar sits astride a horse rallying his legions to battle you\u2019d be forgiven for thinking you were watching a Roman-era war epic-except that the protagonist is a chimpanzee.<\/p>\n
\u201cWar for the Planet of the Apes,\u201d the third installment of the rebooted simian sci-fi franchise, opens on Friday to reviews lauding some of the most breathtaking visual effects ever seen in cinema.<\/p>\n
Behind the photo-real apes is Weta Digital, a pioneering Wellington-based CGI studio founded by Peter Jackson that has seen its reputation grow steadily since its groundbreaking performance-capture work on his \u201cThe Lord of the Rings\u201d movies.<\/p>\n
Filmed against the stark snowy vistas of Alberta and British Columbia, \u201cWar\u201d sees director Matt Reeves unleash the rapidly evolving simians into a world boiling over with divisions and rage.<\/p>\n
A band of soldiers led by a battle-hardened loose cannon-Woody Harrelson channeling Marlon Brando\u2019s Colonel Kurtz-launches an all-out attack to destroy the apes once and for all.<\/p>\n
The movie is driven by Andy Serkis as the majestic Caesar, reprising a role for which he has drawn even more acclaim than for his other digital characters, Gollum in \u201cRings\u201d and King Kong.<\/p>\n
\u201cPhysically in this film, Caesar is much more upright and he uses his hands a lot more now, so he\u2019s more like a human being in ape skin,\u201d Serkis says in the production notes.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut as his intelligence and abilities have grown, the things he feels and remembers have become more daunting to him.\u201d<\/p>\n
Digital fur<\/p>\n
As in the previous films, Serkis wore a gray bodysuit and facial recognition dots that captured the tiniest nuances of movement, gesture and emotion of the apes.<\/p>\n
The 53-year-old actor, whom many believe should have won an Oscar for his pioneering work, has always maintained that there is no difference between playing a part in a motion-capture suit and performing in costume and makeup.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re not just standing in for the role until the magic\u2019s done later on. You\u2019re not just representing the character, you are the character for real,\u201d he says in a behind-the-scenes featurette released recently by Fox.<\/p>\n
\u201cWar\u201d features a dozen key ape characters that interact with increasing sophistication, not just with each other, but with their environment, including falling snow.<\/p>\n
The crew included a team of 50 visual effects personnel, a 10-person camera unit and an army of data wranglers, surveyors and photographers who 3-D scanned every inch of every set and location.<\/p>\n
They crafted an array of more than 1,400 highly complex effects shots, deploying advanced software bringing new levels of complexity to how digital fur behaves and interacts with the world.<\/p>\n
A newly-built toolset called \u201cManuka physLight\u201d modeled with pinpoint accuracy how cameras pick up and respond to light so that the crew were able to light the apes similarly to how a cinematographer would light a soundstage.<\/p>\n
The crew studied how snow sticks to fur, clumps on it, falls off and reacts as the apes walk through their wintry environments. Caesar alone had almost a million strands of hair.<\/p>\n
Towering effects<\/p>\n
\u201cIt looks insanely realistic,\u201d said Serkis. \u201cIt\u2019s just such a brilliant technology and I\u2019ve embraced it. I actively want to push the boundaries so that this movie is the most thrilling on every single level.\u201d<\/p>\n
Weta\u2019s visual effects supervisor Dan Lemmon, who joined in 2002 to work on \u201cThe Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers,\u201d says the technology has improved dramatically.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll of our fur systems, how we model the way light moves through the scene and other materials, have all grown significantly more sophisticated,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
\u201cWar\u201d will be competing with \u201cSpider-Man: Homecoming,\u201d \u201cWonder Woman\u201d and several other effects-laden blockbusters, but industry tracking estimates the US opening at a healthy $65 million.<\/p>\n
That figure would be in the same ballpark as the two previous installments, which went on to earn a combined $1.2 billion worldwide.<\/p>\n
\u201cWar\u201d has a 96 percent approval rating on the Rotten Tomatoes website, which collates reviews, with the most enthusiastic superlatives all reserved for the towering effects.<\/p>\n
Even BBC critic Nicholas Barber, who didn\u2019t like the film, describes the technical wizardry as \u201cfrighteningly advanced.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe textures of leathery skin and thick hair are so convincing that you quickly forget that you\u2019re watching actors in motion-capture suits,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou feel as though you\u2019re watching real live apes, even if those apes are carrying assault rifles and riding horses.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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