Captain America: Civil War
"This job...we try to save as many people as we can. Sometimes, that doesn't mean everybody. But if we can't find a way to live with that...then next time...maybe nobody gets saved." - Captain America
release year: 2016
genre: action/adventure
viewing setting: home Bluray, 3/5/17 and 9/15/16
synopsis: Acts of terrorism divide the various heroes, while a new threat secretly looms.
impressions: The crux of this film is legislation putting the Avengers under the control of the United Nations. I'll state my fundamental problem first, to get it out of the way: the final element that led to the legislation was a picture from a security camera. What? It's 2016, people; such pictures (and in fact, entire clips of video) CAN BE FAKED. Did it occur to no one that the whole thing was possibly a set-up? Yes, I realize that there were already problems with the public perception of super-beings, and I realize that the Winter Soldier already had a track record of death and destruction, but still...governments, the public, and some otherwise-intelligent heroes were all tricked far too easily. But I guess that's one thing that makes Captain America Captain America. He believed in the concept of "innocent until proven guilty" and was willing to go to war for that principle. Having said all that, I'll next say that this movie really felt like an extra Avengers movie. It certainly had plenty of action (the big mass super-fight at the airport was everything that any fan could ask for!) plus some espionage elements, and of course a complex moral dilemma. I found it to be thorooughly enjoyable.
acting: There's a huge cast here, and I'm not going to discuss them all. Chris Evans is Captain America, leader of the faction that doesn't want superheroes to be controlled by the government. Robert Downey Jr. is Iron Man, whose arrogance and guilt help push him toward the other viewpoint. Sebastian Stan's Winter Soldier is once again at the center of things. Returning Avengers include Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Paul Bettany, Elizabeth Olsen, Anthony Mackie, and Don Cheadle. Chadwick Boseman debuts as the Black Panther. Paul Rudd is Ant-Man and Tom Holland is Spider-Man, and both are funny as well as competent. William Hurt is a former general, current Secretary of State, and a real asshole. Daniel Bruhl is the mastermind bad guy with a really complicated revenge plot.
final word: One of the best of the superhero movies, both action-wise and plot-wise.
back to the main review page