‘It is always the image that someone chose; to photograph is to frame, and to frame is to exclude.’

Susan Sontag, Regarding the Pain of Others

Shoot first, ask questions later. It’s a phrase that applies equally to the combat soldiers and the photojournalists at the heart of Civil War. From the opening scene to the provocative closing credits, Alex Garland’s new film follows a team of old-school correspondents who document a near-future dystopian United States at war with itself. They constantly insert themselves into the middle of skirmishes for the shot. A dogmatic devotion to capturing the moment is what drives both the plot and its characters. They are individuals with no backstory, married to the profession even as it destroys them psychologically. Through their unwavering lenses the audience observes this civil war, as well as the interpersonal dramas that unfold within it. But are those lenses really as ‘objective’, or even as ‘anti-war’, as director Alex Garland intended them to be?

The two protagonists of Civil War are quickly established within the archetypical veteran-rookie/mentor-mentee relationship. The older is Lee Miller (Kirsten Dunst): a world-weary industry veteran who agrees to take on a type of protégée in the naive yet ambitious Jesse (Cailee Spaeny). With supporting comic relief doled out by Joel (Wagner Moura) and avuncular wisdom by Sammy (Stephen McKinley Henderson), the team races across the northeastern US towards Washington DC with the lofty goal of interviewing the quasi-fascist president (Nick Offerman) before his inevitable downfall.

With such a mineral-rich set-up there is plenty of room to explore any number of interesting and poignant socio-political themes that define Western democracy. But this film refuses each of them. Garland states that his intention was to be like those ‘old-fashioned journalists’ who ‘deliberately removed bias’. He attempts to forgo the unavoidable subjectivity of framing in favour of what he believes to be a detached objectivity. Garland wants to give the audience facts, not context. Lee even says to Jesse at one point: ‘We record so others can ask.’ But in this case, by removing bias and context, the only thing the viewer is left with is the superficial spectacle and suspense of armed conflict.

Nick Offerman as the president in Civil War (courtesy of Roadshow)

Beyond this, the film’s lack of position feels like a clever marketing tool more than anything else. By omitting context (What caused this divide? Why did the president disband the FBI?), Civil War allows the viewer to imprint their own beliefs and motivations onto each ambiguous plot point. The trailer and subsequent online discourse confirm this film was intended to be sold as a violent image of a divided America where anyone could be right or wrong. In fact, political polarisation, racialised violence, and the ethics of drone strikes are just a few topics that are visually addressed only to be quickly abandoned. This form of political impotence feels like something that’s great for making money, but horrible for the art form. In that sense, Civil War is a perfect action movie, and an infuriating piece of social commentary. It’s worth asking if this film, with its refusal to take a stance, has anything to say at all; and what purpose a steadfast adherence to neutrality actually serves.

Nearly halfway through the 110-minute runtime, while observing a distant battle, Lee wonders aloud to Sammy about the point of her profession. She cites the decades of photographs she sent home from myriad war-torn places, how she ‘thought they were warnings’, and how she is bewildered to witness it in her country. This sentiment echoes the famous Sontag quote from On Photography:

photographed images of suffering … do not necessarily strengthen conscience and the ability to be compassionate. It can also corrupt them. Once one has seen such images, one has started down the road of seeing more – and more. Images transfix. Images anesthetize.

And indeed, can photographs ever stop a war? Garland has stated that Civil War is ‘intended as an anti-war film,’ but it falls short on multiple counts. One striking example is the climax scene, where tank convoys blast through barricades in a hail of gunfire while storming the White House. In no way is this anti-war; it’s pure entertainment. It is the quintessence of François Truffaut’s claim that you can’t have an anti-war film since all films about war devolve into spectacle.

That said, Civil War is undoubtedly entertaining. Dunst and Spaeny deliver dutiful performances within their archetypes. The sound design is both surprising and overbearing in equal turns (a De La Soul song being interestingly deployed). As with Ex Machina (2014) and Annihilation (2018), there is an undeniable magnetism to the way Garland crafts mise en scène. Each scene is uniquely and richly detailed, so it’s a shame these details are largely eclipsed by the film’s affected amorality.

To believe that there can be any objectivity in portrayals of war is to believe you can please everyone. In this way, Civil War pleases no one. As Sontag says: ‘To read in the pictures only what confirms a general abhorrence of war is to stand back from an engagement with … a country with a history. It is to dismiss politics.’ Likewise, to believe that it is even possible to make an anti-war film, especially one so concerned with its own framing (or lack thereof), is a futile act – as unimaginable as the supposed alliance between Texas and California.

Civil War (Roadshow) is on national release now.