Scene Analysis

The Idea of Betrayal and Revenge through the Eyes of Matt Reeves’ Dawn of the Planet of the Apes

In Dawn of The Planet of The Apes, Matt Reeves creatively illustrates betrayal and revenge among the family of apes. The apes have gone through many traumatic experiences together and have come a long way just for them to split and turn against each other. Caesar, the leader of the apes, has put everyone before him and takes care of his own. His efforts get them to a point of stability, but when their lives are put in danger one of his most trusted companions starts to question his decisions. The scene being analyzed is when one of his closest mates turned against him and started a war between the apes and the humans. The director mainly uses lighting, sound, and camera angles in ways that capture the feelings and mood of the moments in the scene.

After Dreyfus gives a speech reassuring his people, they stand tensely waiting for the apes to arrive. The director utilizes camera shot, sound, and symbolism to show the very tense nature of the unjust fight initiated due to an ape betraying its leader. The angle of a shot can drastically change the mood; though the situation is the same, the two different shots give off two completely different emotions. While waiting, we were given a close-up of the people’s faces, the way that you can see clearly into each person’s eyes and how they try to still themselves tells the viewer their possible anxiety levels and confusion as to what they are about to face. Using a close-up like that intensifies the degree of the situation and keeps people watching waiting to see what happens next. On the other side, the director puts you in the midst of the apes. They ride in on horseback or run towards the city. The mood switches from a tense nervousness awaiting uncertainty, to intense hunger for revenge. The sound in this scene is what gives it that extra push. At the beginning of the moment, a slow drum beat is used to create the atmosphere. During the pan across the peoples’ faces, the drum can be perceived as their hearts beating against their chest as they wait in fear of not knowing what is about to come through the shadows. On the other side, the drum is still present but is overrun by the sounds of the horses and apes. On the side of the apes, it is much louder; their hollers fill the streets and definitely make their presence and anger known. The change in sound emphasizes the amount of desire for vengeance that the apes had felt. When it comes to symbols, there are a few present. The humans stand ready with their guns drawn and aimed; the apes are also harmed and ready with any other guns the humans had. Just before, the ape leading the fight, Koba, had rushed the armory. Going against their word, the humans may have felt betrayed by the apes for using their own weapons against them. The color black and darkness could be a symbol in this situation. Darkness can represent the unknown or emptiness; The humans who wait in their now lit-up city are facing towards the darkness that surrounds it; they wait for the apes who come through the grey mysterious haze into the hopeful light. The apes are also black, so you could interpret it as them being shadows who lay dormant in the darkness waiting for a reason to strike; that reason being revenge. Black can symbolize death as well as rebirth; the horses that the apes are riding in on are black and the apes themselves are black. The people in the city only want to survive and get back to a normal life, but there is this darkness that lies outside the city that could either be good or bad. The rebirth aspect of it would be that the apes have built a new life for themselves after escaping the labs.

When Carter is looking around at the damages and effects of the battle, the director uses camera shots, lighting, and sound to emphasize his feelings towards the situation he has gotten himself into. In the midst of the fight, one specific ape is shown, Caesar’s son Carter. The director gives multiple close-ups of his face, the viewer is able to clearly see the hurt and confusion in his eye; throughout the movie, Carter goes back and forth between listening to his father and listening to Koba. The viewers are also given a point-of-view shot showing the destruction and damage that is being caused by this unnecessary fight that Koba has started. In Carter’s eyes, you can see the hurt he is feeling as he watches his own be killed as well as those crying for help. Lighting is a big part of this scene. All that surrounds them is fire blood and darkness. Fire is a means of destruction and rebirth; the fire that surrounds Carter is the result of his and others’ actions for going against their leader in hunger of illogical revenge. The blazing red of the fire mixed with the darkness of night that surrounds them could be the unknown of what is to come from the result of this fight. None of them know how this will end, if they win and build a new life, or if they lose are back to square one. The sound at this moment has now escalated from the last one. The director is now utilizing music. In a fight scene, most people would expect the music to be upbeat and intense, but while the focus is on Carter, it is this slow heart-wrenching music that makes one feel as if what is happening is totally unjust. The other sound present in this moment is the fighting; the sound of gunshot and screaming is muffled but still clear in a way, but…while all of that is muffled the sound of an explosion is clear as day. The emphasis on the explosion sound adds depth to the feel of the fight. 

When Koba steals the tank, the director uses lighting, camera shot, and sound to show the unnecessary repercussions of what he had started due to his reckless actions. In the shot where Koba is shown taking two men out of a tank, the lighting in the shot consists of red and black. The color red is most times associated with danger, blood, destruction, etc. In the fight, there are explosions, fire, and blood everywhere. The fire surrounding him is the degree of damage caused by what he started as well as the intensity of the rage he feels against the humans as he tries to get revenge for the trauma they have caused him. The darkness at this moment is the death that has occurred on the terms of Koba going against the leader of the apes because he was angry. The drumbeat sound from the beginning of the scene has gotten heavier as the fighting went on. Accompanying the drum there is an eerie sound on top adding to the horrible nature of the battle. While Koba is in the tank you can still hear all the explosions and gunshots very clearly; The destruction and cries of the fight are made clear as the ape who has gone against the rest continues to gain on the humans. But in the last few seconds of the tank scene, the sound is then muted (not completely). It goes quiet for those moments before the scene change and all you see is Koba motioning to the other apes to head inside the city.

Rage and hurt can motivate rash and unnecessary decisions. In this scene, Matt Reeves uses multiple film tools such as lighting, camera shot, sound, just to name a few, to illustrate the idea of betrayal and revenge. An Ape named Koba becomes hungry for revenge against the humans because the leader Ceasar is trusting the humans to not interfere with the apes due to the history he has with them. The way in which the scene is portrayed shows the intense hunger felt by Koba as he fights the humans as well as the hurt in The leaders’ son’s eyes as he realizes what he has gotten himself into by following the betrayer.