Matt Reeves Talks "Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes"

Just ahead of his presentation for "Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes" at Comic-Con-this weekend director Matt Reeves talked to Thompson on Hollywood about the sequel.

Reeves told the site that he radically changed the original drafts of the script and shifted the timeline of the story:

"When I got involved the story initially took place further down the line, the apes had evolved fast. What excited me was the idea of going back to finding a way to get on the path, I did not want to jump so far ahead. I restarted the first movie that put you in the heart of the apes, knowing that in the canon, the 1968 movie I saw as a kid, you know what that world is about. That was the beginning. So this leads to the original film. How does that work? That is where it’s going. I did not want to go too far and miss how it developed."

He also talks about the geography of this new world and the location shooting for the film:

"The ape civilization is in the woods, between Vancouver and New Orleans, the world after what happens with the simian virus flu. The two main locales are San Francisco and the Muir Woods where the ape civilization is born. We’ll be doing a little shooting in San Francisco as well. A lot of the Louisiana shooting was to build huge wood sets outside in the woods to add realism, enormous exterior streets. We’re shooting in the rain, in the wind, all on location out in the open in the elements."