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“What kind of American are you?” asks a nameless soldier (Jesse Plemons) in fatigues, wearing a pair of sunglasses as red as red can be, pointing a loaded gun and casually scratching his cheek. In a film filled with several numbingly shocking – and, yes, shockingly numb – moments, this is perhaps the most tantalising.
We wait for Alex Garland‘s much-anticipated Civil War to finally address the Donald Trump-size elephant in the room. However, it is not to be.
One can only surmise why Garland has chosen to go down this road, of a divided America at war with each other, and then opted to remove all the signposts.
The English writer-director had drawn some negative chatter about playing with fire at a time when the US stood so polarised ahead of its presidential election. Could that be the reason his Civil War draws battle lines which don’t fall along any noticeable Red and Blue lines?
A more charitable explanation is that he intends Civil War to be a parable of our times, where widening societal divides, left unchecked, could lead even the first world to this madness.
The land of the free is, of course, also the land of freely available guns, consumerism, huge inequalities, anti-immigrant rhetoric, and Disney World. So, casual, mindless violence sits next to casual, mindless oases of indifference. Snipers shoot from picture-perfect houses set amidst vast greens. Teenage killers pose happily in between hanging men who are bleeding to death. And there is no telling one side from the other.
The only two distinguishable opposites are a President desperately hanging on to power (Offerman), who has entered his “third term”, which means he has gone against the Constitution; and some heroic journalists.
The latter, riding an SUV into the heart of the battle, include celebrated war photographer Lee (an achingly exhausted Dunst), her gung-ho reporter Joel (a painful Moura), a wannabe war photographer Jessie (an out-of-depth Spaeny), and the dyed-in-the-wool Sammy (a ticking-the-boxes Henderson).
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As per the snatches of information which come our way, a ‘Florida Alliance’ comprising the unlikely team of California and Texas has declared secession from the US government. Now these ‘Western Forces’, which may or may not have help from some other states, are headed to the White House to take over the country.
The brainwave that Joel and Lee are chasing is to get the President’s interview before that happens, if it does, and photograph him at it. As per Joel, “it’s the only story left to tell”. Huh? Along the way, horrors pile on, as they do when people turn upon people, including a mass grave, hanging bodies, random firing, sniper shootout etc etc, but Garland focuses more often than not on the photos taken by Lee and Jessie.
It doesn’t occur to Joel to ask questions even when they reach a refugee camp where people left homeless overnight are sheltering, with perhaps many stories left to tell. Instead, he joyously joins a group of children who are skipping ropes, even as Lee and Jessie have a casual conversation about life as their photo roll dries in the breeze.
It doesn’t say much for journalism as practised by Joel and Lee, or by Jessie, who is like a child let loose with a camera. However, it perhaps says much for how immune one quickly becomes to things around us.
As helicopters hover overhead and Humvees roll on the ground, one wonders whether Garland is also drawing a parallel to the many wars America has waged in distant lands, casually indifferent to the destruction it wreaks.
Now, as Garland shocks us with visuals of the war reaching the White House, with its defences shattered by the “rebels” professionally and ruthlessly – and as we watch it in the knowledge of the January 6, 2021, “insurrection” following Trump’s loss – tragedy hits home in the figure of Dunst.
The veteran of many a combat, who draws her camera when others would flee, crumbles before our eyes in the face of what is befalling all that “journalism” is meant to uphold.
The tragedy of Civil War – and its journalism – is that she is the only good story it tells.
Civil War movie cast: Kirsten Dunst, Wagner Moura, Cailee Spaeny, Stephen McKinley Henderson, Nick Offerman
Civil War movie director: Alex Garland
Civil War movie rating: 3 stars
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