No explanation, just a divided America, at war and without water. We fight in the squares, on the highways, in the parks, in the airports and the enemy is another American just like you. It's Civil War, the disaster-political-movie directed by Alex Garland in theaters from April 18th with 01.
Here are the protagonists and the story. The journalist Joel (Wagner Moura) and the photographer Lee (Kirsten Dunst) as good reporters have decided that there is only one story left to tell: interviewing a president of the United States (who looks a lot like Trump and played by Nick Offerman), now time entrenched in Washington while a ferocious Civil War spreads reminiscent of January 6 on Capitol Hill, but multiplied to the power. The two journalists thus leave for a trip to the capital, joined by the elderly and limping reporter Sammy (Stephen McKinley Henderson) and the young photographer Jessie (Cailee Spaeny) who sees in Lee a model to follow. For them, a road trip begins among a thousand ferocious micro-conflicts, hundreds of abandoned cars, noisy war helicopters, while what remains of the official government, which reports to the president, clashes with the Western joint troops of Texas and California .
Aside from the exasperated cynicism of these journalists who prefer to photograph the death of a colleague rather than save him, the cult moment of Civil War is the one featuring the great Jessy Plemons in the role of a secessionist soldier with very clear ideas about who is American and who doesn't. And so when he finds himself on duty at a checkpoint, complete with disturbing glasses with red lenses, he is capable of extremely syncopated and effective interrogations. From him, just a few questions about your origin and maybe you're safe, but if you pass yourself off as American and your features and your surname say otherwise, a machine gun shot to the chest and the matter is closed.
But what is really behind this work and how much does it tell us about America today? Despite the controversy aroused by the film even before its release in the States (where it will arrive in theaters on April 12th) Civil War, according to the director, could have also been set in his native England or in any other democracy, because the true origin of this The work is the "demonization of the political adversary, the assumption of both sides of a position of presumed ethical superiority which disqualifies the opposing party and prevents any confrontation, ever widening the divisions". And Garland then specifies: "I started working on this film around 2018 (at the beginning of Biden's mandate), after noticing that there was no longer civil disobedience in the world and having seen many different protests on pro-social issues over the years. -Trump, anti-Trump, gun control, climate change and Brexit. I was surprised that, even though there were so many problems, people weren't actually marching in the streets." Regardless of Garland's distancing, the political climate in the United States today is hot to say the least amid the clash between current President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump. Civil War probably won't affect the outcome of this comparison at all, but it will certainly make us reflect on this courageous film which is also the most expensive from the indie production company A24 (50 million dollars).
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