Film Review: CIVIL WAR

Jesse Plemons, Nick Offerman and Kirsten Dunst risking their careers.

Having shunned it when it was released last March, I finally saw Civil War after a good friend promised that it was "not too violent or gory -- no, nothing like that." 

First of all, I am going to suggest that my friend get herself tested for her hearing and eyesight. Secondly, I will warn anyone who has not seen it that it is nothing but very violent and very gory. It is also dumb, stupid and loud. 

As far as the plot -- it's people shooting people. FYI, no explanation of what started all the shooting, or what's behind it. The story centers on a group of journalists who are covering the war and taking a lot of pictures. One must assume that the director/writer Alex Garland intended a deeper meaning, but don't ask me what it was.

The musical score is occasionally fun, sometimes annoying and always inappropriate for what is going on visually, which is usually someone getting shot, or maybe bleeding out from a gaping wound, or perhaps squirming around in a pit of dead people. These are scenes that don't necessarily want music, but if music is mandatory it should preferably be something other than electronic dance music. Here again, I found the director's decisions perplexing.

Kirsten Dunst stars and does a good job of looking miserable and depressed, but that likely didn't require any acting ability. Really, all she had to do was think about how her promising career had somehow gone off the rails and landed her in this mess of a movie. The remaining cast members are actors unknown to me, except for Nick Offerman who has literally two lines, and Jesse Plemons, who is uncredited but gives the film's best performance in a five-minute scene as a trigger-happy soldier reminiscent of Brad Pitt in Inglorious Basterds, a far superior film that you should see instead.