Bangs And Flashes: A Review of “Captain America: Civil War”

Last updated on: September 13, 2016 at 10:23 pm by Mary Pezzulo

Bangs And Flashes: A Review of “Captain America: Civil War” 2016-09-13T22:23:56-04:00 Mary Pezzulo

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

posterposter

Captain America: Civil War is now available in the usual assortment of digital and disc formats.

I was excited about this one. I enjoy Marvel movies; I admire the way the take the rather outlandish and often stylized world of comic books and weave it into the relative realism of live action films. I like how a character who’s played a part in hundreds of complicated comic book plots is presented to the audience so clearly, so quickly that we don’t need to be comic readers to appreciate them. I also like all the little in jokes that please people who have loved Marvel comics for years. Marvel movies have consistently impressed me, and I was prepared to be impressed again. But I’m afraid I wasn’t 100% impressed. It wasn’t a bad movie overall, but there were a couple of flaws that kept me from thoroughly enjoying it.

Captain America: Civil War involves a plot to frame Cap’s old partner Bucky for a terrorists plot. Due to an agreement with the UN that most of the Avengers signed, only a few of the Avengers will believe him or help him save Bucky and get to the bottom of the intrigue before chaos is unleashed on the world. Spider-Man and Ant Man make appearances. There is a funny cameo by the wonderful Stan Lee. There are explosions. There are acrobatics. There are drawn out angsty arguments and guns that go “piu piu piu.”

I’ll cut to the chase (which this film doesn’t) and give you the positives first. Foremost is the character building for Steve Rogers (played by Chris Evans) and Tony Stark (Robert Downey Junior). They way they are pitted against one another is very well-written and plotted, and their acting is phenomenal. I never completely felt for Steve Rogers in any Marvel movie before, but this film had me genuinely admiring him. I really liked the way the characters deepened throughout the film, and I’m excited to see where they go next.

Another overwhelming positive is that the blockbuster fight scene involving Spider-Man an Ant Man is awesome. It’s one of the best fight scenes I’ve ever watched in a superhero movie. It’s well choreographed, it’s colorful, It’s funny, the stakes are high, we care deeply about all the fighters on each side, there are surprising twists at every moment. Tom Holland is excellent as Spider-Man. I would have loved to see a whole film of just Spider-Man and Iron Man snarking at one another. And after that fight sequence comes a tragic and disturbing climactic ending that could have come out of classical myth; I was on the verge of tears. The last hour of this film is absolutely wonderful. I would gladly buy the DVD so I could watch the last hour again and again. Unfortunately, Captain America: Civil War is two hours and twenty-seven minutes long. And the first hour and a half of the film drags.

The first hour and a half of Captain America: Civil War follows a fairly consistent pattern. First we get an establishing shot of a city landscape, with the name of the city superimposed over it in white. Then, after a brief setup, we either get a grand mal seizure of a fight scene with the camera moving too fast to tell what’s going on, or else we get a massive explosion, or a scene of an assassin doing something truly awful in a cheap motel, or sometimes two or three of these. Then we cut to the Avengers looking angsty and arguing in expensive rooms with large windows. Some of this argument actually builds character, but a lot of it feels like filler. Then there’s another establishing shot and we go on from there. I usually like Marvel’s balance of exposition, character development and over the top fight scenes, but for me, this hour and a half did not properly gel. It was balanced too heavily toward angst. There’s a generous smattering of curse words in these arguments and the fighting is violent, so I want to caution my readers that this movie is not appropriate for small children. There were several Kindergarten-aged children in the theater at my viewing, and they did not seem to enjoy themselves. I wouldn’t bring my daughter, though I do plan to just show her the bits with Spider-Man when it comes out on DVD.

I don’t object to violence in films. I’m a firm believer that everything that exists in human experience needs to exist in art, so a movie is a fine place to portray violence, sex, cursing and anything else. But these elements need to be portrayed very artfully, in a way that tells truths, or else it’s just a kind of porn. In my view, there are two ways in which you can portray violence in a film. You can have flamboyant swashbuckling violence with minimal gore and no real consequences in a lighthearted movie, where we all know it’s just for fun and escapism, and that’s all right if it’s done well. People daydream and fantasize about such things, and films can show us our daydreams. You can also have intense, gory violence in a serious film, violence that makes us face the horror of what war and killing really are. People need to understand the unfortunate truths lurking in their daydreams as well. But I don’t think it works to go half and half, which Captain America: Civil War attempts to do. There are moments of highly choreographed bravado with a ludicrously small amount of actual killing– how many times do you think that a seasoned martial artist like Black Widow could grab an enemy goon by the head or shoulders yet never break anyone’s neck? Yet I counted four or five people she grabbed in just that way and then tossed, still alive, to the floor for the janitor to clean up. Have you ever heard of a bomb that blew off the front of a building, blew out all the windows, filled the room with flame and smoke, yet only killed its intended target and no one else? The prince of Wakanda, who was standing right by the window, is left alive with only a few cute little cuts on his face; furthermore, Black Widow, who was also in the room, didn’t smear her lipstick, muss her hair or get any dust on her perfect black clothes. The king of Wakanda is killed, yet the corpse is completely intact for the prince to mourn over afterwards. At other times, the violence is realistic and disturbing. There’s a broken spine. There’s a drowning as part of a torture interrogation. There are shootings and a screaming man who sets himself on CGI fire. It’s not consistent. It vacillates between rather sexy violence and traumatic attempts at realism. The result is that, while we don’t get to have the lighthearted fun we had watching the Avengers save Manhattan from an alien invasion, we also don’t get to have a real, serious look at violence either. It just feels patchy and a bit manic. I think this could have been fixed if Marvel had just decided to make an r-rated film and show all the violence realistically. I suppose they could have also toned down the violence and made it appropriate for those children in the audience, but then we would have lost the chilling and really worthwhile climax where all the emotional strength of the film is. Much better to just decide that the film was for adults and pull out all the stops.

Captain America: Civil War is not a perfect film and certainly not my favorite Marvel movie. But it does have a lot of very worthwhile moments, particularly in the latter half. Inveterate Marvel comics lovers will probably enjoy seeing the whole thing, and adults who don’t object to the inconsistency of violence will have plenty to enjoy if they can sit all the way through it.

(The image is from the official poster for Captain America: Civil War, and is used in accordance with fair use principles.)

Captain America: Civil War

Previous Post

May 5, 2016

How To Survive Mother's Day: Suggestions for Catholic Abuse Victims

Next Post

May 9, 2016 In Excellent Taste: A Review of "Taste And See" by Ginny Kubitz Moyer

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category abortion Abuse Advent America American Christianity angel angels Annunciation Appalachia apparition apparition chaser apparition chasers apparition culture art art review babies baby baby Jesus Bad Lip Reading bad statue contest bath beauty Bible story blog blogkeeping blood book review Brandon Sanderson breastfeeding bus Catholic catholic conspiracy alarmism Catholic Oppositional Disorder Charismatic Renewal Charlie the Cat chastity Christ Christian idenitity Christianity and Judaism Chronic Illness clean clothing COD piece comedy compassion conscience conspiracy theory conversion cop-on-black violence Crucifixion cry of the poor culture Daesh Daily Saints death death penalty devotional diaconate diaper diapers dirty disability Donald Trump Dorothy Day dream drugs Eastern Catholicism Eastern Christianity education election election update Elsewhere on Patheos empathy environment Fear feminism film review fish flashback fluffy buns food Franciscan University of Steubenville Friendship Room fun Gabriel gardening gospel hair-splitting Heaven hell heresy Hillary Clinton history Holly the Witch Holy Spirit holy war Homeschooling homosexuality horror human dignity humor Icon idol immigrants infection inter-religious dialogue Interpretation of Scripture Islam Jesus Jihad Joseph joy laity and lay vocations lamb dinner laundry lent lgbtq literature love manners Mary Medicine and Science Meditation mercy mess milk misogyny Missouri monasticism monster motherhood mourn with those mourn movies movis music mystery nature neurodiversity New Pro-Life Movement news nonsense nostalgia O antiphons obituary objectification Ohio Valley Ordinary Time ordination Ordo Amoris parable paradox Passover peanut butter personal beliefs pets philosophy Planet Charismatic poetry politics polls poop Pope Francis Pope Leo power in the Church prayer prayer request prayers preferential option for non-violence president presidential election priest primary private revelation pro-life prophecy Public face of Catholicism Pure Flix Q and A race racism random rape rape. sexuality reader's request Reckoners refugee religious trauma ressurrection Right to life Saints saints and celebrations same-sex same-sex marriage satire scandal secular feasts seder Seven Joys Seven Last Words sex sexual ethics sexuality silencing six months skid row slavery social justice Speculative fiction spiritual abuse spoon stain story suffering suffrage suffragette Sunday Gospel temple Tenebrae Responsories Terror the exorcist The Friendship Room The New Pro-Life Movement Things I Learned on the Internet tin cup traffic true story tv review Uncategorized USCCB vice and temptation violence Virtue virtue and vice war Way of the Cross whimsy whole life women's ordination work of mercy Year A

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What does "Ephrathah" mean in Hebrew?

Select your answer to see how you score.

The Lord’s House Chosen Land Fruitful Holy Place