For Americans, seeing on the screen their compatriots in conflict, on a warpath and committing murders and various atrocities makes them sick to their stomachs. This is what happens in
Civil War
, which premiered in North America last Friday and, curiously, led the box office that weekend.
Everything happens in a dystopian future, like in
The Handmaid's Tale
, with the United States divided by a new Civil War, with the leadership of California and Texas against the presidential inauguration.
But the one by Alex Garland, a British filmmaker who directed
Ex Machina
, is not a simple fictional action film, because it includes a group of journalists, war reporters, who risk their lives covering the clashes.
There are two journalists from the Reuters agency, Lee, a photographer (Kirsten Dunst), and Joel, a reporter (Brazilian Wagner Moura, from
Elite Troop
and
Narcos
), plus a veteran of
The New York Times
who has a hard time getting around ( Stephen McKinley Henderson). They will be joined by a young photographer (Cailee Spaeny), who is beaten in a riot in New York, when citizens were demanding water.
If they had enough to portray in the Big Apple, Lee and Joel's goal is to get to Washington, to the White House itself, to interview the president. “He doesn't even have a month to live,” says Joel, because the secessionists are advancing at an accelerated pace.
So,
Civil War
is torn between showing the repressions of the military on both sides, war crimes and the relationships of the leading quartet, who cannot believe what they are seeing before their eyes.
Lots of action, but lots of dialogue
And where the film fails a little is precisely in that relationship between the colleagues. When Garland, author of the script, shows them in the car chatting, a certain sentimental disconnection is evident in the group.
What
Civil War
does , and perhaps that's where its success comes from, is that it puts the confrontation, the war, in the backyard of Americans. When on the way to Washington they enter a clothing store, the woman serves them as if nothing had happened, because they decided to stay out of the conflict, something that Joel seems not to tolerate or even want to understand.
In an episodic, but important and strong role, appears Jesse Plemons (
The Flower Killers
, Kirsten Dunst's husband, with whom she already worked in
The Power of the Dog
), who has a character that we are not going to reveal which one it is, but it is one of those that are difficult to forget when the screening ends.
The actress from the first
Spider-Man
trilogy is accompanied by Cailee Spaeny, who comes from being Priscilla Presley precisely in
Priscilla
.
The film will clearly divide waters in the United States, but much of what we Argentines see on the screen we have seen on our street, except for the desire of the revolutionaries to assassinate the president.
"Civil war"
Very good
Action/Suspense. United States, 2024.
Original title:
“Civil War”
. 109', SAM 16 R.
From:
Alex Garland.
Starring:
Kirsten Dunst, Wagner Moura, Cailee Spaeny, Stephen McKinley Henderson.
Theaters:
IMAX, Cinemark Palermo, Hoyts Unicenter, Cinépolis Recoleta and Pilar, Showcase Belgrano and Norcenter.