So I saw a movie yesterday, and it’s Civil War, and it’s not what you expect.
Mrs. Know-It-All and I went to the movies last night, and both of us were trepidatious about seeing this one, because we were concerned it might be triggering in some way. The marketing has pushed this movie hard, and there’s a through line we’ve all seen in the advertising. Heck, it’s even in the name. It’s supposed to be about a civil war. I don’t know that that’s what it’s about.
I’m going to start non-spoiler, and then we’re going to dive into the movie itself.
If You’re Worried About Seeing It
If you’re concerned about this being triggering, Mrs. Know-It-All was more affected than I was by some of the violence she saw portrayed. You’ve seen it in the trailers. There are scenes of people hanging, and visuals like that. The problem is we live in a modern era where we’ve seen these things. There are three moments where this movie has something to say, and it’s not about what you think it is.
So if you’ve been telling yourself, I don’t want to go see this, it’s going to be triggering, left, right, whatever, whoever, it’s none of those things. Go see the movie. Seriously. Feel safe seeing the movie. Is there some gruesome imagery? Yes. But it’s nothing we haven’t seen in every horror movie or murder mystery or thriller.
The acting is mid, and I don’t mean that as a knock. It’s mid because they’re behaving like real-life people. I don’t normally go to the movies to see movies like this. I promised you guys this year I would see more films, so I went. It’s not an Oscar award-winning anything, and maybe that’s the problem. Maybe I went in with different expectations, and this movie defused them by not being anything I thought it was going to be.
The Most Exciting Part Wasn’t in the Movie
The most interesting part, truthfully, was probably the movie theater, because there were all types of people at the one we went to. We were in the front row, because it’s a very comfortable AMC theater and the front row is comfortably far away. Two seats down, a gentleman showed up. Camo cargo shorts. A particular type of shirt that espoused a particular group, right or left, I’m not going to get into it, it doesn’t matter. A big long Jack Black looking, Tenacious D sized beard. A USA bandana, red, white and blue. Sneakers and whatever else. Have I painted that picture?
We were there a little bit early. He walks in, sits down, reclines his chair, and he’s just there. At certain parts of the movie he would fold his hands. He was taking it in, very much. And as soon as it was done, he got up and left.
I remember looking over at Mrs. Know-It-All, and I went through so many scenarios in my head. That was the most exciting part of the movie for me, and it wasn’t even in the movie.
What I Told My Friend
Overall, it’s worth seeing. A friend of mine was going to see it 30 minutes after I did, and I called him up immediately. Hey, have you seen the movie yet? No, I haven’t. Okay, do me a favor. Lower your expectations.
The movie isn’t bad. I went in the way you go into something you know is going to upset you but you know you have to see, whether that’s a responsibility you want to have as a person, or civic duty, or whatever you want to call it. I went in very much, okay, I’m going to go watch this, I’m going to watch this. And then I was kind of deflated the whole time. What is this? It had more documentary vibes than anything.
My friend told me afterwards that the advice helped. He was able to enjoy it differently than he might have if he’d gone in like I did. So if you haven’t seen it yet because you think you know what it is, do yourself a favor and go watch it. It’s nothing you think it is, trust me, and maybe you can enjoy the movie on those merits.
All that out of the way, here come the spoilers.
Lee, Joel and Jessie
Kirsten Dunst is Lee Smith, Wagner Moura is Joel, and Cailee Spaeny is Jessie. They’re not together yet when it starts.
The movie actually opens with Nick Offerman as the president, rehearsing what his speech is going to be, about how they’ve won a decisive victory and this and that. He’s reviewing it almost actor style, saying the things he needs to say. He’s doing his Nick Offerman-ness. Then we cut to the full actual thing, and it’s Kirsten Dunst in a hotel. You see a fire or an explosion not far away, a scene from the trailer we’ve all seen, and she’s watching his speech with this face on like, what is going on. Nothing spectacular. Nobody’s going over the top. Everyone’s acting the way a normal person would. Real life is actually kind of underwhelming sometimes when you compare it to the hyperbolic nature of films and cinema.
Then we cut to what looks like a protest of some sort. Lee and Joel are there, and so is Jessie, who’s a 23-year-old trying to get her bearings. She wants to be a photojournalist and she idolizes Lee Smith. She’s running around with her little teeny camera taking pictures of stuff.
There’s a lot of show, don’t tell in this movie, though they show you what I consider to be the wrong things. What I genuinely loved about this moment is this woman. You get no name for her whatsoever. She puts on a vest, she’s got a flag, and come to find out she’s a suicide bomber. An American suicide bomber. She runs with the flag, and as soon as she runs by, Kirsten Dunst’s character grabs Jessie and pulls her down, because she’s got years of experience with this kind of thing in other countries. She knows the signs.
That’s the one thing they give Kirsten Dunst’s character, a lot of wisdom because of what she is. You find out later she was one of the youngest photographers to catch some really important moment back in her college days, and that made her famous immediately. Lee and Joel work for Reuters, and Jessie is the outsider. It’s about the journey for Jessie.
The War Is the Backdrop
The movie centers around this photojournalist group. As I’m sure many of you have heard, the country’s been split. You have the United States, then you have the Western Forces, which are apparently Texas and California, and then Florida has tried to become its own thing. You hear on the news, from the president and some other people, that Florida failed to pull North Carolina and some other places in with it. Everyone’s trying to divvy up as quickly as possible during all this chaos. But Florida is inconsequential aside from that mention.
We hear that the president served an illegal third term. He disbanded the FBI. He used an air strike on Americans, on American soil. Those are some of the things, but they never give you a point in time.
Everything in the advertising tells you this is a movie about a civil war. The civil war is a backdrop. It is 100% not the focus.
The First Time It Has Something to Say
There’s an old school reporter named Sammy, played by Stephen McKinley Henderson. You might remember him from the first Dune. Sammy’s a journalist who writes. The goal is that Kirsten Dunst’s character and Wagner Moura’s character are heading to Washington, determined to get in front of the president, ask him some questions and take his photo. Period. Sammy just wants to get to the front lines, which is Charlottesville, Virginia. So they’re all moving through together, and this is their road trip. This is the weirdest road trip movie you’re ever going to see in your life.
They stop overnight in this parking lot area, and it’s the scene you’ve seen in the trailers. Kirsten Dunst is sitting on a sofa, Sammy’s sitting next to her, and she says that every time she went to go shoot something, she thought she was sending home a warning. Don’t do this.
That’s a good moment. Sammy comes right back at her and says, oh, you’re having an existential crisis. She absolutely is. You have this photojournalist who’s gone all over the world filming the wars, and she’s asking what the heck it was all for if nobody at home listened, if nobody learned the lessons. She’s got this strangely defeatist mentality now. In retrospect, seeing where the movie ends up, it all makes sense.
What Kind of American Are You
The second time is the moment we’ve all seen, with Jesse Plemons. His character is clearly for the president. Not for the Western Forces, not for Florida.
The journalists are on the road, and they run into two Chinese journalists who are part of the same organization, obviously out of the Chinese office. They play this road game. One guy, to feel alive, jumps through the window from one car to the other while they’re going top speed. So Jessie wants to do the same thing. She’s yelling, she’s feeling alive, and she jumps through. The other car goes speeding off, and Kirsten Dunst’s character almost runs off the road because of a military truck. That’s when they lose sight of them, and she’s saying, I want Jessie back in this car. Apparently nobody has cell phones.
They find the car with its doors open, and they follow. We don’t know how he got them, but Jesse Plemons’ character has a giant grave full of bodies. None of the bodies are in uniform. That’s the first sign of trouble, that these guys aren’t just crazies trying to get away with murder.
Old guy Sammy can’t go with them. He can’t run, he’s not fast enough. Everybody else goes out there, because they’ve got both Jessie and the other journalist, Bohai, played by Evan Lai. Nelson Lee plays Tony. Tony’s the one who crossed over into their car, and Jessie went into the other one. Bohai and Jessie are on the ground. Jesse Plemons’ character has his gun, he’s in full military fatigues, and he and his buddies are just burying all these bodies. That’s when our people show up, and there’s this huge altercation. The guy’s like, oh yeah, this guy here, this is your buddy? Bam. Pops him. Done.
But there’s no shock value for us, because we’ve seen Jesse Plemons be crazy. They cast him for a particular reason, and I feel like this movie would’ve been better served by casting unknown people, because then we wouldn’t know what to expect. It’s like back in the day when you would cast Alan Rickman as a villain. I’m sorry, we all went, oh, Alan Rickman, the guy’s a bad guy, clearly. When you see Jesse Plemons, he’s not playing a good guy. You just know. They telegraph it, so when he pops Bohai, I’m not stunned.
I was actually more stunned by what happens next. He begins asking everybody where they’re from. Joel’s like, we’re all Americans. You’ve seen that scene in the trailer. And he goes, okay, what kind of American are you?
Joel says he’s from Florida, like, please don’t hold it against me. He’s so ashamed of ever being from Florida, which I identify with, because I was raised in Florida. Jessie’s family is in Missouri. Kirsten Dunst’s family is in Colorado. Then they get to Nelson Lee’s Tony, who is sobbing. Tony knows. And he goes, China. And dude goes, oh, you’re Chinese. Okay. Yeah, China. Yeah, I got you.
Then I jumped. I’d call it a jump scare, but really it was just so shocking, because one second Jesse Plemons is being rational, and then kapow. Done. Everyone freaks out, it becomes this yelling match, and Sammy shows up to the rescue. Sammy comes in in the clutch. He drives the press SUV they have, this giant Tahoe or whatever, and slams into Jesse Plemons’ character, and it knocks Jessie into the grave. That moment where you see her having to climb over bodies to get out, and Joel is freaking out but has enough sense to go get her, is surreal.
Sammy’s like, get in the car, and they all jump in and go. One of Jesse Plemons’ friends runs out, finds a gun, it jams, and then he gets his shots off. They’re driving down the road, and at one point Sammy says, I need someone else to drive. He’s been shot.
Horrific, but Gorgeous
They put him in the back seat and keep driving through the night, and everybody is still stunned. It is the most well-shot moment in the movie. There are fires happening in the forest and embers everywhere, and you see him leaning against the glass, looking up, and through the reflection he’s just watching the embers. Mrs. Know-It-All said that scene’s gorgeous. It’s horrific, but gorgeous, the way it was filmed.
The movie is filmed beautifully. There are set pieces everywhere. I skipped some parts because I feel like they’re important enough for you to see for yourself. There’s the gas station, which is the part with the hanging people. And there’s the small town they go to, where the movie begins to want to say something. That’s the scene from the trailers. “Are you guys aware there’s like a pretty huge civil war going on all across America?” “We just try to stay out. With what we see on the news, seems like it’s for the best.”
The first time I saw that I thought, oh, is this what the movie’s trying to say? We’re apathetic? Because the whole time I’m trying to understand what this movie is saying. What is the message? What is the story here? That’s when I finally realized the story is obviously the photographers and the journalists and their journeys. None of this had the through line I thought it was going to have.
The Third Time, and the Last Photograph
They make it to the base, and you find out the president’s generals and advisors have all surrendered to the Western Forces. The Western Forces pretty much just have to march into Washington and take it. Nick Offerman’s president is holed up. For so many blocks around the White House, they’ve built a wall with checkpoints in it.
It looks like the president and the Secret Service are going to make a break for it. They bust through the walls, and the Western Forces military are taking them out. By this point Kirsten Dunst’s character has begun having something that looks akin to PTSD. She’s not able to think too clearly. Meanwhile Jessie has come into her own. She’s taking pictures, she’s in every moment, she’s in the face of it. In earlier scenes you saw Joel dragging her along to teach her how to do stuff. Now she’s out in front of Lee, and you’re just like, dang, look at her go.
They do catch and dispatch the president in the end, and that whole scene is fine, but it’s kind of empty compared to what happens just before. They’re whittling down everything, stopping all resistance. There’s a squad of however many, six people, whatever. At one point they take out the president’s secretary, who’s supposed to negotiate for his safety. They’re like, yeah, sure, come out here, we’ll make sure he’s nice and taken care of. Bottom line, they’re done with him. This feels like the Osama bin Laden thing, like Saddam Hussein. This feels like they’re going in to take out a despot.
Before that, Jessie is getting riskier and riskier photos, and finally she jumps out in a hallway where all these guys are pointing guns. Kirsten Dunst sees it, shoves her down, and stands in the hallway. And they do this wonderful thing where you see it frame for frame through Jessie’s pictures, black and white, and you see Lee get hit, and you see her go down. Her character is unceremoniously gone. Jessie stands up, walks a few feet, looks back, and then she’s on the job.
That was the third time it had something to say. Then it’s over, and it ends just as unceremoniously. As the end credits roll, you see what looks like a photograph developing, and it’s soldiers posed up with the body of the president.
I remember thinking to myself, that’s it? Really? And sure enough, that was it.
The Verdict
Civil War lands at a 7.7 out of 10 on the Know-It-All Index. On a different platform I gave this thing a C+, and for me that’s what a C+ means.
The acting is fine, because remember, they’re trying to be real people, but there’s nothing that stands out about it. You get very little backstory about any of the characters. Everyone is what you see is what you get. It feels like the movie wanted to be something that it wasn’t, and that’s why I said it’s mid at best.
I think I’m underwhelmed because I went into it with different expectations than what I got. That’s why I’ve been saying don’t go in with expectations, otherwise you’ll be disappointed. I feel like there’s a better movie in here than the one I saw.
Let me know what you thought of the movie if you’ve had an opportunity to see it. And if you were worried about seeing it and you finally did, please tell me that too, because I’d love to know if I helped get you there. The conversation lives in the comments on the video above.
