Summary
A civil war breaks out in the US but the thing that will kill you is not the air strikes or the bullets but the incredibly obvious message that is being beaten into your face until it’s a pulp.
What shocks me the most about this film is that it was made by a British director, normally it is the American’s that put their politics front and centre and think that the Red vs Blue struggle makes for interesting viewing for those far from their shores, it doesn’t we don’t care, but no here it was a Brit.
Alex Garland as far as I am concerned is a hack, Ex Machina was okay but really nothing to write home about, then came his messy and pretentious foray with Netflix, then Men another statement film that came and went without anyone caring about it and now this. There is talk that he is going to give up directing after this and all I can say is thank God.
Before I get into it, can you guess what the message was, go on I’ll give you a minute though you won’t need it……………
If you guess that the clear Trump stand in right wing American’s are bad for the sheer fact of existing, and that it is as much a comment on how divided America is right now as it is that the right wing should just go away and everything will be better. Believe me I am no fan of Trump, I am as a non-American who has no interest in US politics thought the guy was a bad joke that shows what happens when you underfund your schools, but this strawman argument is beyond ridiculous. The whole point of the film is to be controversial but not in the sense that it is going to take shots at the left and the right, no in the sense that it goes oh look at how extreme the MAGA crowd is boy aren’t they bad, an obvious statement to make, and then takes a victory lap to bask in how profound that message is.
Overall, the film industry will be a better place without Alex Garland in it.
1/5
Pros.
The action is interesting
Cons.
The message is so obvious
It is pretentious and smug
It is incredibly obvious
No one cares about an election that happened 4 years ago now serving as the very obvious inspiration for a film
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Another Millennial Reviewer 