The new Disney+ film about a talented gorilla might leave you wondering about the real great ape that inspired the story. We have answers.
Can a gorilla ape Banksy? That's the setup of Disney's new animal welfare flick, The One and Only Ivan, inspired by the true story of a silverback gorilla who spent 27 years intimidating children at a shopping mall in Tacoma, Washington. In the film, he becomes politicised over his imprisonment and expresses his outrage through art. Directed by Thea Sharrock and based on K.A. Applegate's Newbery Award-winning book of the same title, this retelling is candy sweet compared with the real Ivan's cameo in the 1991 documentary The Urban Gorilla, which turned him into a 500-pound cause célèbre. This computer-animated Ivan is able to speak for himself (in the voice of Sam Rockwell). As legal efforts in Germany, Argentina and the Balearic Islands have established precedents that could make primate personhood a future civil rights fight, what's the film's ratio of fiction to fact? We answer this and other questions below.
Ivan resents the stereotype that silverback gorillas are angry chest-thumpers. Are silverbacks really the most violent gorilla species?
First, silverbacks aren't a species. Silverback is a literal description for a male gorilla whose black fur has begun to turn gray on his shoulders and spine, which happens around the wizened age of 13. Yet, while calling a human a "graybeard" or a "blue hair" is an insult, "silverback" is synonymous with "alpha." In gorilla society, age equals status. Instead of reaching for the hair dye, a silverback enjoys the adoration of a harem of females, while lonely younger males skulk in exile. A silverback will fight rival troops and juvenile punks looking to seize power, but he's no particular threat to humans.
![The real Ivan, who was caged in a shopping mall for 27 years until being released to a zoo. Photo / Getty Images](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/resizer/v2/HG3VJK77ZPYWSEYDQQXZOLFLQE.jpg?auth=5d9024318f8b1fcf6fb44795b5f8f440d09a75ca46dd215fdb300384df25f9fb&width=16&height=11&quality=70&smart=true)