Captain America's team sprints into action in Captain America Civil War
I don’t want to be that guy, but I guess I’m going to have
to be. In order for a Superhero film to work for me in 2016 it has to do something
more than simply be there. Allow me to elaborate. There is a lot of pop
entertainment that floats around in the either just waiting to be consumed. It
comes in all forms whether and it is a constant bombardment. This creates an
environment where it can be difficult to occupy any sort of brain space,
something can capture interest for an instance only to be upended as quickly as
a blink. It takes something more than just a piece of normal pop entertainment
to remain in the consciousness long enough to make a true impression especially
if it is a part of a field as overstocked as the superhero genre.
Let’s get this out of the way I liked Captain America: Civil
War, it’s just nowhere near as good as it thinks it is nor does it live up to
the ambition that is thrown onto screen. Civil War clearly wants to be
something more than your average piece of pop entertainment, it tries to tickle
with ideas of Greek tragedy, and post 9/11 imagery, but at the same time it has
to be a film that appeals to enough people to make an astronomical amount of
money. It’s a balance that can be achieved, but must be done so organically.
Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight which remains the gold standard of the “superhero
genre” is the perfect example. It’s a film that doesn’t feel like it is making compromises
to tell its story while at the same time manages to play by at least some of
the rules of the genre. Even Captain America: The Winter Soldier is a film that
manages to fit its around the genre organically, creating a fun and tense mix
of superhero and espionage that never feels like it’s being held back by having
the popularity magnet of Marvel splashed on it.
The main issue with Civil War is that it does not tie all of
its elements together organically and as such feels constrained by what it has
to be. There are at least 4-5 different films worth of material that are
crammed into its two and a half hour running time and none of those films are
completely served. It leaves the film a little bit empty, characters are not developed
in a way that feels whole and complete, the motivations that set the film off
are flimsy at best and laughable at worst, and while the climax is impactful in
the moment even seconds later the holes that allowed the film to get there make
themselves readily apparent. The biggest example of this for me are the
motivations of the two leads, Captain America (Chris Evans) and Tony Stark/Iron
Man (Robert Downey Jr.). The reasons why either takes the side of the UN’s
proposed restrictions are explained by single triggering events rather than
character arcs. We never get to see Stark actually struggle with the consequences
of the Avenger’s actions he just heads full long into the bill because of a confutation
with a woman near an elevator. I know we had Iron Man 3 in which Tony does
struggle with a bit of PTSD but the filmmaking language of Civil War chalks up
his action to this single confrontation instead of using the character development
in the previous film to explain his motivations. The same applies to Cap who
never really has his beliefs reinforced save for one line from another
character midway through the film. I would not have all that much of a problem
with this if the film tries to tie each of these events as a part of character
arc progressions but the filmmaking language of Civil War seems to treat the initial
incidents as full stops instead of pieces of the puzzle. These full stops leave
holes within the fabric of the storytelling, and lessening their impact in the
long run.
This lessening of impact is especially felt as the film
reaches its major climax. I will not go into spoilers, but the final conflict
that ultimately drives the climax of the film is very well done in the moment
but feels more and more empty when analyzed alongside the rest of the film. The
storylines that gets us to the final moments of the film are muddied because of
how busy the film is and none of the character arcs are fully defined. It makes
for a very intriguing scene in the moment but one that fails to be as impactful
as it wants to be. The pieces that should allow the climax to be as impactful
as they could be are either missing or are completely underserved leaving
emptiness as the impression that the film ultimately leaves behind.
I did have a lot of
fun in Civil War, but even so all of the film’s poppier moments feel a little
bit underserved. There is only one real fun and creative action sequence in the
film, and while that one sequence is really great it feels like there could
have been so much more. It also feels like I never quite get enough time to
hang out of with these characters. This is a good thing in one since, my
longing to hang out with these characters means that the Marvel crew has done a
good job of making them likable. At the same time, it means that each of the
characters are being undersold. I want my hour long episode tracking some of
the early Spiderman adventures climaxing with him getting the call, or a fun establishment
of Black Panther, or the episode where we get too old for this crap Hawkeye. It’s
not even that I want stand alone films for these character but I want them to
be more developed within this interesting overarching storyline. When all these
arcs are as shallow as they it really lessens my interest in the overall plot
of the film even if I am having fun watching the proceedings.
Captain America: Civil War is a fun film but one that never
does anything well enough to leave a lasting impression. The film fails to have
the focus that made its predecessor as good as it was, and doesn’t have the
depth to reach as far as the Nolan Batman films. It leaves an experience that
only feels like it goes halfway on all of its fronts. Ultimately emptiness is
the primary feeling that Civil War leaves and sadly it will be yet another
Superhero film that does not occupies my interest for too long.
Grade: B-
-Frederick Cholowski
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