Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes kicks off the next instalment of a much-loved franchise and has just opened in New Zealand cinemas.
The big-screen blockbuster is set several generations on from the last movie, when the apes well and truly rule the world.
All hail Caesar! Even when the mighty ape has long been gone, the apes who came after him have taken over.
And one way or another they worship his legacy.
After three amazing films from director Matt Reeves, he hands over the monkey mantle to Maze Runner filmmaker Wes Ball.
Ball creates a world where the apes live in clans on a planet almost entirely devoid of humans.
The story centres on a young chimpanzee Noa, his peaceful clan and his family torn apart by a power-hungry rogue clan ruled by the fearsome Proximus.
When Noa's journey sees him begrudgingly joining a young girl, his life and the future of the apes and humans alike will change forever.
Honestly, it's astonishing the visual effects work that Wētā FX does on these films.
The performances, and the rendering of those performances into stunningly life-like ape characters that you connect with from the very first frame, were phenomenal.
The human strand of Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes though, was oddly the opposite, lacking consistency.
But as a big big screen experience? I'm still with the apes.
Four stars.
