Rise of the Planet of the Apes

Released: 2011
Sci-fi
Director: Rupert Wyatt
Starring: James Franco, John Lithgow, Andy Serkis, Frida Pinto
Running Time: 105 minutes
Rated: PG-13

The breakdown:  A scientist/doctor (I guess) experiments with an Alzheimer's drug and tests it on monkeys.  The drug has an unintended effect on a certain chimp and it enhances its knowledge and understanding, eventually leading to the monkey starting a chimp uprising.

This movie was really dumb in parts, which ruined the whole movie.  First of all, James Franco is in it and he's completely overrated and an arrogant asshole in real life so I can't stand him.  Then they make him this super smart, young, scientist, or doctor, or whatever he's supposed to be and you're supposed to believe that he comes up with the cure to Alzheimer's?  (To make this better, they should've cast an older actor where you could believe, he or she's been working on a cure for their entire careers.)
He tests the drugs on apes and one day they don't realize that one of their apes was pregnant (don't they supervise them and keep them away from stuff like mating?) and she goes ape shit (had to use it here) when they try to get her out of her cage.  They end up killing the mother after she gets out and attacks people and then they find the baby in the cage that she (somehow) hid from everyone.
The baby has a heightened awareness and is highly intelligent since they tested the drug on his mom; I guess he has a strain of the drug developed in him.
After they have to kill the mother, Franco decides no one will miss a baby ape and takes him home to home school it. (sure)  Franco's dad (wonderfully played by Lithgow) has Alzheimer's and has a nurse who lives in the house with them.  She quits because Lithgow is getting dangerous with how confused he gets and fast forward 5 years, the ape's sometimes taking care of the father.  Ridiculous heh?
Anyway, the monkey gets loose trying to protect Lithgow from an angry neighbor and animal control is called.  (They live in San Francisco by the way, so I'm totally sure that having an ape in the suburbs is legal and no one would've noticed before.)
Franco and his veterinarian girlfriend (Pinto) put the ape in a "sanctuary" thinking he'll be ok for a while, but the sanctuary is really just like a human prison where the apes are mistreated and the one smart one starts to lead the others.  Eventually, they all kill some people, break out, and kill some more people leading to the over taking of the planet. 

This movie is so poorly done, I can't imagine why they made it, or why they are making another sequel.  Just see the original with Charlton Heston and save yourself some anguish.

2 out of 5 stubs for Lithgow, special effects, and Andy Serkis playing the CG chimp.  Do NOT see this.