The Need for a Revolutionary Cinema in the Belly of the Empire

CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR (2016)

Greetings, fans! Sorry I’m late to this review, but I had to get some music-related stuff done. But, today, I am here to give you guys my opinion on Captain America: Civil War! When I was going in to see this film, I was really only looking forward to two things: Black Panther and that big superhero brawl at the airport. And when I finally went to see it, I got all of that…and more. This is probably one of the better films to come from the Marvel Cinematic Universe in the past few years. Why? Well, I’ll tell you after the story.

Plot: It’s been a year after the events of Avengers: Age of Ultron. We open in Lagos, Nigeria, where Steve Rogers/Captain America (Chris Evans), Wanda Maximoff/Scarlett Witch (Elizabeth Olsen), Sam Wilson/Falcon (Anthony Mackie), and Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) are on a mission to stop a former enemy named Brock Rumlow (Frank Grillo) – a villain from The Winter Soldier – from stealing a biological weapon. However, the ensuing fight results in the death of some humanitarian workers from Wakanda. Later at the Avengers headquarters, we see Secretary of State Thaddeus Ross (William Hurt reprising his role from The Incredible Hulk) informing the Avengers that their activity has resulted in a lot of collateral damage, the event in Nigeria being the straw that broke the camel’s back. Because of these events, the UN is planning to ratify a document known as the Sokovia Accords (named after the city that was destroyed in Age of Ultron) which will grant the government intervention on the Avengers’ activities. The team is not uniform in their opinion: Tony Stark/Iron Man (Robert Downey, Jr.) supports this because he feels responsible for what happened in Sokovia and thinks that the Avengers need to be controlled, while Steve thinks that government intervention would cause more harm than good. In Vienna, a UN conference is held for the signing of the papers, where we meet T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman) and his father, T’Chaka, the King of Wakanda. However, a bomb goes off at the building, killing T’Chaka. Security footage reveals it to be Bucky Barnes/Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan) who apparently orchestrated the attack, giving T’Challa a reason to go after him…as Black Panther. However, Steve isn’t too convinced and tries to go personally talk to Bucky. However, after a complicated series of events, Steve is branded an outlaw who must be taken in by Iron Man. So, the battle lines have been drawn with Team Iron Man, which consists of Black Panther, Black Widow, James Rhodes/War Machine (Don Cheadle), Vision (Paul Bettany), and a newcomer named Spider-Man (Tom Holland). On the other side is Team Captain America, with a roster of Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner), Ant-Man (Paul Rudd), Winter Soldier, Scarlett Witch, and Falcon. From here on out, it’s high-flying thrills to see who will win. Little do they know that a mysterious man named Zemo (Daniel Bruhl) is off to the side with his own agenda.

Wow…I mean, where to even start with this review? What can I say about this film that everybody else hasn’t already said? It’s really good! The first thing I want to start off with is the themes with which this film grapples. Lately, it’s been a common criticism of superhero films that they face no consequences for the collateral damage that they cause. Well, this time, they do face consequences with the imminent threat (or blessing) of government intervention. And this theme of consequences contributes to the film’s biggest strength: the development of the characters. Because of the fact that there are so many characters, the two characterizations which I will focus on are Tony Stark and Steve Rogers.

The great thing about these two is that neither completely right nor completely wrong. You can understand where both of these guys are coming from. Tony Stark feels a great amount of guilt for what happened in Sokovia, seeing that it was he who built Ultron and therefore set this whole thing in motion. That, plus a stern talking-to from the mother of an individual who died there (played by Alfre Woodard) is enough to convince him that the Avengers need to be controlled by the government. But, as Steve so intelligently points out, the government is not perfect; it’s run by people with agendas, and who’s to say that those agendas won’t come into play later and cause an even greater casualty? So, there are pros and cons to both points of view.

And at the center of it all is Chris Evans and Robert Downey, Jr, who make this movie work so well. They both just capture the internal struggle through which their respective characters are going so well. When you watch Robert Downey, Jr., you know that he’s struggling under the weight of his own guilt and is trying his best to do the right thing. In fact, this reminded me a lot of his character arc in Iron Man, when he realized that his weapons were being used irresponsibly. The same goes for Chris Evans as Steve Rogers; you can also see that he too wants to do the right thing, but his motivation comes from a bit of a different place. While Tony’s motivation comes mostly from guilt, Steve’s comes from his want to keep the team together. Bottom line, these performances help make the movie so good.

But it doesn’t just stop there. All the other actors do a great job. Sebastian Stan is great as the Winter Soldier, Elizabeth Olsen gets more to do and she gives it her all, Anthony Mackie does great, the list goes on. But, my two favorite performances are from Chadwick Boseman and Tom Holland as Black Panther and Spider-Man, respectively.

First, we’ll talk about Black Panther. Holy cow, have they managed to make him cool! Chadwick Boseman has the African accent down pat, he’s an intimidating presence, and they even gave him a good character arc which I won’t spoil here. And the Black Panther suit just looks amazing! It has a sleek style to it and it looks great when used in action, with retractable claws and a bulletproof vibranium finish to boot. I cannot wait for his movie to come out!

And now, for Spider-Man. Before I get into this, I am not going to compare this guy to Andrew Garfield or Tobey Maguire because that would be a little unfair; he only has a few scenes in the movie. That having been said, Tom Holland was the right choice for the MCU’s version of Spider-Man. He sounds like a kid out of high school, we definitely get the genius vibe coming from him, and his suit looks incredible (they came up with a practical reason for why the eyes on his mask shrink and grow like they did in the comics). Not only that, but he definitely sells it as a dweeb, which makes for some great one-liners during the airport fight scene (he talks about everything from laws of physics to The Empire Strikes Back, and it’s hilarious).

Speaking of which, the fight scene at the airport is fantastic. The action is great, Henry Jackman’s rousing orchestral score sets the tone very well, the one-liners are seriously funny, and it’s just so fun to see a multitude of superheroes go head-to-head in combat. It literally is the stuff comic-book dreams are made of; to describe it anymore would be depriving you guys of the opportunity to see it for yourselves, which you should definitely do!

If I really, and I mean REALLY, had to nitpick a problem with this film, it would be the cinematography in the first half. It relies heavily on handheld camera work, which not only makes it hard for the audience to see what is going on, but also can cause nausea in some folks. It lessens as the film goes on, but it’s still very prevalent in the first half.

But that’s a minor gripe. Everything else about this film is perfect. The writing, the action, the music, the characters; they all hit bullseye.

Bottom line: What more can I say? This movie is really good! See it if you haven’t already!

And that is my opinion on Captain America: Civil War! Join me next time for my Throwback Review!