Cultural Diary, May 2024
Civil War (2024), New Roman Times (2004), Born in Flames (1984), Ice (1970)
Everyone sure did have opinions about Alex Garland’s Civil War. Here’s mine: You all are not wrong that the movie’s background and premise make no sense and that its politics are weird and goofy.1 But I think you are wrong if you claim that that in itself makes it not a good movie. Of course it’s a good movie. It’s memorable, involving, and well-acted. There’s something horribly indelible about that last shot, with Suicide’s “Dream Baby Dream” playing. (Though perhaps any image set to that song would affect me the same way; that song always makes me feel as though the Angel of Death were about to unhinge her jaw and swallow me, but she’s hauntingly beautiful.)
I couldn't understand why it haunted me so much, that last shot.