Sequel to the 2011 franchise reboot Rise of the Planet of the Apes, which raises the question what is the difference between a "dawn" and a "rise", as they pertain to planets of Apes? Anyway this film picks up about 10 years after the events of the previous movie, the ALZ-113 Virus which was just starting to spread at the end of the previous film, has now succeeded in wiping out 95+% of the human race, we learn of this through a fairly well done opening sequence that brings us up to speed on the events of the last decade. Caesar's group of super smart Apes have succeeded in establishing a successful colony in the California redwoods. Caesar thinks of the humans often even though the apes haven't seen sign of them in years, that is until a small group of humans headlined by Jason Clarke (an actor whose career I am glade to see humming along) and Keri Russell (whom I'm always glade to see) happens upon them. There is a brief tense standoff but Caesar sends these well meaning humans away and then sends Koba and a few others to follow them back to where they came from.
It turns out there is a colony of surviving humans being lead by a surprisingly reasonable Gary Oldman in San Francisco. Caesar, Koba and many other apes visit the human colony to warn them to keep too themselves and leave the ape settlement alone, however as the humans are running out of power and Clarks group had gone to the redwoods to reactivate a hydroelectric dam there, conflict seems inevitable. Clark prevails on Oldman to let him try to come to a peaceful agreement with the apes, and he comes very close to success with this, were it not for Koba's pride and obsessive hatred of humans, who of course once brutalized him.
Entertaining and mildly though provoking this movie does a good job of moving the new ape saga along, with interesting characters and good action. We learn nothing more about the mission to Mars crew that was quite deliberately set up in the last film, but I guess they will come into play later. Also it seems that there are a fair number of human survivors left so increased conflicts between man and apes seem to be more or less a given for the next film in this series. In another node to continuity James Franco even makes a brief appearance in this film by way of camcorder. ***
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