The Review: Civil War

Civil War 2/10

This movie was 95% ass. L and I decided to check this out and it caused so many headaches during and after trying to make sense of a story where the writer/director left things vague purposely. This is in the future but not sure how far into it. The US is in a civil war where the states are all picking sides. I refuse to get into that nonsense but Texas and California are warring against the president who is in his third term and refuses to step down. These two states have the help of the Western Forces. Spread out through the country are militias and weirdos with too many guns making up their own rules. We follow a war photographer named Lee and her colleague Joel. They head to a hotel for the press and see this old dude named Sammy. Sammy is Lee's mentor. They plan on heading to DC to interview the president before he is killed. Sounds like a stupid plan, but okay. This young woman named Jessie that hero worships Lee ends up tagging along and this is where the movie immediately goes downhill.

See, I have a thing about young folk in movies. They tend to be incredible young actors/characters or they are annoying as fuck and meant to cause trouble. The cat in A Quiet Place: Day One was more useful and less harmful than Jessie. They on the road and get to a gas station that is shady as fuck. Jessie heads off on her own and is followed by this guy that shows her two guys hanging by their arms that he and his friends plan on killing later. Lee changes the tone by offering to take pictures of the guy with his trophies. Jessie is mad she didn't take pictures.

The group of an angry photographer, her semi-insane friend, an old man, and this child find a group of soldiers fighting another group of soldiers and get put in danger every moment taking pictures. Jessie continuously gets into harms way. I kept saying “Get the fuck down! Get out of the way!” This becomes more important later. The group end up in this small town and its like nothing else crazy is happening in the rest of the country. Clean streets. Shops open. People going to work. Jessie gets Lee to put on a dress and take pictures. This is all a waste of time. So much of what they do is a waste of time. Sammy notices there are armed gunmen on rooftops and everything is not as nice as it seems.

On the road the see a dead soldier and end up shot at by a sniper. The hunker down with some other snipers and the first one is taken out. What was the point of this whole scene? Whatever. Moving on. Jessie asks Lee is she would take a picture of her being killed and Lee is like “Bet.” Oh, I wish. While driving this car speeds up to them and it appears to be a threat until they find out its two other photographers that Joel knows. While drunk he let folks know where they were headed and now its a race to DC. One of the guys gets into their car while its driving and Jessie jumps into the other and speeds off. They go at the speed of light and vanish. Lee is run off the road by a military vehicle. They make it back on the road and see the Jeep Jessie was in pulled over with doors open.

Jessie and the other guy are being led to a truck full of dead bodies with three armed soldiers. Sammy is like “Everything about this shit means death!” They are like “Okay, but we are younger and can move and you old so we going.” They march up to these guys and say they are press. These guys don't give a fuck. He asks them where they are from. He kills one of the guys (who is Asian). He asks Jessie where she is from. He asks Lee. He asks Joel who says he is from Florida (by way of Central America). The soldier kills the other photographer because he is from China. He is about to kill Joel when Sammy plows into the soldiers. Jessie is knocked into the body pit and they rescue her and speed away...eventually. Sammy asks someone to take the wheel as Jessie vomits in the back seat. Sammy got shot and dies in the car. Joel is very upset.

They arrive at a military base and they are told that the military is gonna take out the president and his hanger-ons. Joel is pissed saying now its too late to get an interview. They spend like five minutes showing the military flying and driving away. This movie has a lot of scenes that drag on with music that does not fit. I should not have been bobbing my head to De La Soul in this movie. Makes no sense. The next, like, 20 minutes is watching people get blown up as they storm DC. Jessie is constantly being yanked away from danger while Lee is having a nervous breakdown. Lee, Jessie, and Joel make their way inside before the military and more shooting happens. They kill a lady representing the president and his planned surrender.

They are almost at the president and shooting more people when Jessie is like “Its time to get someone else killed!” and stands in the middle of a shootout that is about to happen. Lee jumps in front of her and gets shot in the back and dies and Jessie gets photos of her dead ass body falling on top of her. They find the president, get his final words, and Jessie take the photo of the soldiers posing with his corpse. Yay?

This movie had us asking far more questions than could possibly be answered. Obviously done by someone that did not grow up in this country. Hell, I have not seen most of this country and know that some of the alliances would never work together in a thousand years. The way it was shot looks good and that makes sense because it turns out I have seen most of this directors stuff. But the story was so simple an hour could have been trimmed from this. I couldn't suggest this to anyone unless they just wanted to stare at explosions and listen to gunfire. I would never watch this again and refuse to spend anymore time trying to fill in the blanks made by the creator.

Kirsten Dunst as Lee Smith

Wagner Moura as Joel

Cailee Spaeny as Jessie Collin

Stephen McKinley Henderson as Sammy

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