4. Silent Opening - Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes
There's something viewed as risky about dialogue-light sequences in mainstream movies. Whenever the characters aren't talking that must mean the plot isn't moving, meaning these sequences are, shudder, tone setting. Much was made about Wall-E's silent first half hour and how ballsy it was, and while it's easy to think making a big deal of that is patronising mainstream audience's attention spans, it's true there is an element of risk to it; The Artist, a nearly dialogue-less movie, may have gained massive award success, but that was mainly due to its plot directly dealing with its lack of sound. The latest film to employ silence was Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes, but unlike Wall-E and The Artist it came with very little fanfare. The trailers put much focus on the human side of events and the moments when the apes were actually talking, making the prominent continuation of Rise's sign language as the primary form of communication for the opening a real surprise. It's certainly a strong move for the series, whose central element has been the apes ability to talk; in both the original series and reboot the defining moment in the revolution was when an ape first screamed "no". Director Matt Reeves has stated a key inspiration for the film was sci-fi touchstone 2001: A Space Odyssey and the influences of the Dawn Of Man sequence (which also inspired the film's name) can really be felt here, with time spent showing the early stages of an intelligent society.
