Review: Civil War

-


Official synopsis: A journey across a dystopian future America, following a team of military-embedded journalists, Lee (Kirsten Dunst) Joel, (Wagner Moura) Sammy, (Stephen McKinley Henderson) and tag along Jessie (Cailee Spaeny) as they race against time to reach DC before rebel factions descend upon the White House. 

As soon as I heard "Western forces of Texas and California" in the trailer, I knew this movie was going to be apolitical. The "why" of this war isn't even vaguely addressed. You can read between the lines a bit here and there, but really this is a film about war photographers, not the civil war named in the title. When you go into it with that in mind, it will make for a much better watch. 

Lee is tired. She's seen too much, she's practically on auto pilot throughout this entire film and she's trying to provide just enough advice to young Jessie while also keeping her at arms length. It's their relationship that's the crux of the film, and in my opinion also the biggest downfall. Jessie's character exists to cause trouble. She's young and impulsive, and she gets plenty of people killed along the way. It made it impossible to like her and it made Lee's protectiveness of her implausible. And the thing is, I don't think the movie even needed her. I think it could've gone on just fine with Lee, Sammy and Joel. It's just an added inconvenience for drama. 

The ending makes the film lose several points for me. It's acted well, the sound design is great, but in the end it's very middle of the road.

Grade: C+

Comments

  1. Candice FrederickApril 22, 2024 at 10:20 AM

    if it was a good movie about war photographers, they should feel real, understood and coherent. neither this movie nor its filmmaker seem to really understand their job. that was a big problem for me as a viewer

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamApril 23, 2024 at 8:06 AM

      I can agree with that. Especially Jessie, who is just inexplicable as a character. I think the film would've been better without her, and just focusing on fleshing out the other three.

      Delete
  2. AnonymousApril 22, 2024 at 10:55 AM

    I liked this a lot more than I expected to. I appreciated Garland's approach in that he knows people will bring their own politics to his movie. I think he's much more interested in showing the horror of a possible future if we don't realize the roles we all play. That really worked for me. Interested in seeing it again to see if I feel the same way.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamApril 23, 2024 at 8:05 AM

      I agree, I expected to be very bothered by the lack of politics in it, but I also ended up enjoying it more than i thought.

      Delete
  3. thevoid99April 22, 2024 at 2:53 PM

    I thought about seeing this in the theaters but I think I'll wait when it's available for streaming. At least it's good to see Kirsten Dunst get another box office win as there's been some career retrospectives about her lately as I'm glad she's getting lots of praise and attention. Now where's her fucking Oscar?!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamApril 23, 2024 at 8:05 AM

      Yes. I'm always here for a Kiki win, even if I don't love the movie.

      Delete
  4. RuthApril 24, 2024 at 11:16 PM

    I missed the press screening for this but come to think of it, I think I'd feel more comfortable watching this at home on streaming. Even though Garland said the movie isn't political, I feel like some people would still take offense against it.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Thanks for stopping by, let's talk movies!
(comments are moderated to reduce spam)

Popular posts from this blog

Review: The Batman

-
Image
Bruce Wayne (Robert Pattinson) has quietly been trying to make a difference as The Batman in Gotham. He can't be everywhere. He works closely with Lt Jim Gordon (Jeffrey Wright) and they face a puzzling crime by a masked murderer going by The Riddler. (Paul Dano) As the stakes get higher, they realize just how deep corruption runs in Gotham.  The Batman is first and foremost a detective story. Director Matt Reeves obviously took inspiration from films like Se7en and Zodiac when he crafted this story. S e7en is one of my all time favorite films, so that worked well for me. I loved seeing Batman and Gordon work as a team. Same with Batman and Selina. (Zoe Kravitz) They ooze chemistry. As much as I love the Nolan trilogy, Christian Bale only really had good chemistry with Maggie Gyllenhaal. Here, Pattinson and Kravitz click together instantly.  I'll admit I was worried about Pattinson as Batman. His Bruce is VERY mopey, which fits with the story. My main issue with the movie,
Read more

Thursday Movie Picks: Wedding Movies

-
Image
How fitting that Wandering Through The Shelves has us start the month of June with movies about weddings. June brides are a thing, right? At least that's what people kept telling me when I got married in June. I just picked it because it was warm. To be honest, I don't like many wedding movies, so this was kind of tough, but here's a few I can tolerate. 1) Wedding Crashers This is one of my favorite comedies until the last 20 minutes or so when it falls flat on its face. But it's so hilarious and quotable before all of that, I can forgive it. Lock it up. 2) Rachel Getting Married I used this one for a pick last year but it's easily my favorite movie involving a wedding. The acting is fantastic. I 3) Corpse Bride Truth be told, I wasn't crazy about Corpse Bride, but like I said. Slim pickings in the wedding movie world for me. I'd watch this over a "classic" like My Best Friend's Wedding or Runaway Bride any day.  click th
Read more

Random Ramblings: The Radio Flyer Conundrum

-
Image
Recently, I was talking to someone about who I thought were the best child actors when I was also a child.  Two that really stood out to me were Elijah Wood and Joseph Mazello, and one film those two were in together was called Radio Flyer.  Then I was reminded about the uniqueness of this film. Instead of reviewing the film, I wanted to have an open discussion about the ending. It deals with a tough issue; child abuse. What I’ve noticed is the way that the film ends is interpreted many different ways, and the filmmakers never came forward to say what was right and wrong. I’m interested in hearing everyone’s opinions on it. How did you interpret the ending? Obviously spoiler alerts will follow.. For those of you who haven’t seen the film, the basic premise is this: Two young boys, Mikey (Wood) and Bobby (Mazello) move in with their single mother and her boyfriend, who refers to himself as ‘The King’. It doesn’t take long for The King to start physically abusing Bobby, and the
Read more