Civil War: A Blistering Foghorn Of A Cautionary Tale
This review may contain spoilers.
This movie is a dire warning. This movie is a bullhorn of a cautionary tale. It’s not even subtext. It’s in the fucking text. I’ve seen complaints that it’s too heavy handed. If you’ve ever had the unfortunate experience of having just a five-minute conversation with the average American about politics you’ll understand that subtext, nuance, and subtlety DOESN’T FUCKING WORK WITH THEM! It’s needs to be spelled out in fucking crayon — DON’T ELECT PEOPLE WHO HAVE FASCIST IDEOLOGIES.
It couldn’t be fucking clearer.
Kristen Stuart (who is giving a career best performance here) as war photography journalist Lee Miller states plainly the thesis of this film: “Every time I filed a report from other countries, I was delivering a warning back home. Don’t do this.” She delivers this line in the same exhaustive, beaten down cadence she delivers most of her lines. Her character, who’s named after the famed WW2 war photographer, is every intelligent American’s spirit animal.
Beyond beaten, beyond broken, just witnessing horror after horror and knowing there’s no more warnings to give.
Caley Spaeny, playing Jessie, is striking here as the plucky young protege to Lee. There’s a turn in the final 10 minutes that you can coming from a mile away but, again, we’re beyond subtlety having any place in media whose intention is in anyway trying to send a message to brain dead, boot licking, capitalist pigs.
Caley plays Jessie as you would expect someone her age to act in a world such as this; strong willed, idealistic, and not afraid to get her hands dirty. Gen Z, god bless them, were handed them the shittiest economy, shittiest environment, and shittiest crop of politicians.
The symbology of Jessie, a gen z’er, growing up in a world on fire is not lost on me.
Her strongest moments, and the ones that will stick with me for a long time, are the moments in the last 10 minutes when Lee gives her life for her. The look on Jessie’s face at that moment will live in my head forever. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Spaeny is so good delivering emotion through facial expressions, given that her performance in Priscella late last year was criminally overlooked.
I only reason I deducted some points here is that many of the musical choices, the songs themselves but also when and where they are deployed, are ill-advised. Although *puts on Obama sunglasses* let me be clear, the SCORE itself is very good. It brings to mind some of the best of Nicolas Britell, If Beale Street Could Talk most notably.
One more thing. There’s a “controversy” about a right-winger getting credit for footage being used in the very beginning of this film. I. Don’t. Give. A. FUck. There is never nor will ever be ethical consumption or creation of art under captialism. We’ve got such bigger fish to fry than some no name fucking nerd getting a one second shout out at the very end of this movie.
Great movie. Grow the fuck up.
