‘Divisive’ Civil War film declares box office victory as liberal states give RAVE reviews amid fears of political violence
Liberal anxiety about the schisms in American politics has turned the Alex Garland thriller Civil War into one of the biggest Hollywood hits of the year.
The British-born director has explicitly steered clear of conventional fault lines, portraying California and Texas as allies against a dictatorial president of an unnamed party who has won himself a third term.
But the vision of an America ravaged by armed militias and torn apart by war has drawn four times as many liberals to theaters as conservatives as it became the year’s biggest R-rated opening to date.
The film, starring Kirsten Dunst, earned $25.7 million in its first weekend after being released on Friday’s anniversary of the first US Civil War and has been criticized by some for coinciding with one of the most fraught election years in history .
“The title alone is enough to spark a conversation in a year where political discourse is top of mind,” said Paul Dergarabedian, media analyst for Comscore. “And they couldn’t have picked a better date.”
Kirsten Dunst, 41, stars as a journalist who travels through a divided nation where a president of three years is battling secessionist forces from California and Texas
The film earned $25.7 million in its opening weekend, becoming the year’s biggest R-rated opening to date
“I think civil war is just an extension of a situation,” director Alex Garland, 53, told The New York Times. ‘That situation is polarization and the lack of limiting forces on polarization’
Dunst, Wagner Moura and Cailee Spaeny star as frontline journalists in the near future during the final days of an American Civil War as rival armies close in on Washington DC.
The plot sees more than a dozen states secede from the union, but the reasons are not given and the doctrines of the rival factions are kept deliberately ambiguous.
“It was a delicate balance,” Garland said.
‘The plan is to make a compelling and engaging film, and the product of the compelling and engaging film is a conversation.
‘So the questions are: How do you make sure you don’t dismantle a conversation in the first part of that equation?’
Despite his efforts, the conversation appears to be heard mainly on one side of the divide, with 19 percent of viewers saying they were Democrats and six percent Republicans.
The Comscore survey also found that 22 percent described themselves as liberal and only five percent as conservative.
Garland has admitted that he considered the Jan. 6 Capitol attack a “disgrace,” and many viewers have argued that his attempts to walk the line between America’s polarized society have not worked.
Nick Offerman stars as a ‘fascist’ president who has given himself a third term in office
Kirsten Dunst stars as a veteran photojournalist who tries to secure an interview with the president as rebel armies close in on the White House
The $50 million film, shot in Georgia, is the most expensive production from studio A24 to date
Garland deliberately tried to create ambiguity for the audience as to who was fighting whom
Cailee Spaeny and Jesse Plemons in one of the film’s most heart-stopping scenes
“The plan is to make a compelling and engaging film,” Garland said, “And the product of that compelling and engaging film is a conversation
The Civil War takes the form of a road movie: a truckload of journalists drives from New York City to their fateful date in Washington, DC
‘Really amazed at all the talk Civil War – a movie where one side is clearly The Bad Guys and is led by clearly Republican Fascists and White Nationalists – is in any way apolitical, because it clearly isn’t!’ tweeted Brendan Hodges.
“The new movie Civil War is propaganda,” added Jonee Fry. ‘The paw prints of the radical left are all over the place.’
“If you want to see a Trump analog tarred and feathered in a movie, just say so,” added Vyce Victus.
Garland, who is also behind Ex Machina and Annihilation, has said that the film’s premise is that there is a ‘fascist president who kills his own citizens’.
“So what has happened is that two states that are in different political positions are saying that we are more concerned about a fascist constitution-smashing violent president than we are about political differences.
‘When things collapse, the speed at which they collapse tends to surprise people, including people like intelligence officers whose job it is to see and predict when these things will happen.
‘Things are always in a slightly more dangerous state than they might appear.
“The consequences of that are so serious that not taking the threat seriously would in itself be another form of insanity. It would just be complacent’.
The film received its largest audiences in LA, San Francisco, DC, Phoenix, Austin and San Diego.
But it also turned out to be hot in smaller red state cities, including El Paso and Waco, Texas, Oklahoma City, Albuquerque, New Mexico and Charlottesville, Virginia.
The $50 million budget film is the most expensive made by studio A24 and opened on 3,838 screens in the US and Canada.
Dunst was at the Los Angeles Special Screening at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures
The gross is more than double the average for a dystopian thriller on its opening weekend, according to industry analyst David A. Gross.
Such films “are generally set in futuristic worlds that look very different from present-day life,” Gross said.
‘Civil War does the opposite: It looks like right now. The film bends the genre into something contemporary and relatable.’
But the director has certainly failed to transcend one of the most pronounced divisions among American moviegoers, with men making up more than 70 percent of the audience.