Civil War is the year’s best film you probably missed

One of the challenges of historical storytelling is the inability to comprehensively depict the contemporary. According to one of the principles behind journalism, as well as historiography, to fully understand the present, a critical (or historical) distance is necessary — a distance that allows the observer to take a neutral perspective when recounting and interpreting current events. In the art world, where the subjective signature of a single author replaces the objective chronology of events, it’s occasionally possible for a work or an artist to capture the zeitgeist of their time. In cinema, two names that excel at this are the production company A24 and director Alex Garland. Their joint effort this spring led to the release of one of the most controversial and representative films of our era, which you likely missed in theaters: Civil War. This post-apocalyptic road movie starring Kirsten Dunst, Wagner Moura, and Stephen McKinley Henderson tells a story of personal growth within an America facing the final days of an imagined civil war. The escalating violence parallels the emotional and professional development of the young photographer protagonist, played by Cailee Spaeny.

For nearly two hours, Garland shows viewers a hypothetical end of the world, using a visual and sonic language consistent with his style seen in Ex Machina and Devs. Civil War is a strong critique of Western society (in general) and the USA (in particular). Its extraordinary visuals, paired with meticulously crafted sound design, make it a deeply intense film. In a present that seems to depict a “now, but not here,” reflecting conflict zones around the world, the director portrays the brutality of guerrilla warfare, leaving the grand movements of power in the background. He does this through precise visual choices, emphasizing the story’s deeper emotions with dominant colors and accentuating the most intense moments with silence or fitting musical scores.

From the opening sequences, one of Garland’s signature colors, a soft yellow, is evident, used to illuminate social spaces that appear normal. In Civil War, this warm light serves a specific narrative purpose: warming the cold architectural environments, transforming concrete labyrinths into representations of shared memories. Under this approach, a hotel lobby becomes a meeting place for old friends, a makeshift setting for escaping the war. Similarly, the inside of a stadium becomes a party amid ruin, where people rediscover lost human warmth. In the face of stripped-down settings designed for practical survival (filling as many beds as possible while ensuring easy escape routes), this warm lighting becomes the final glimmer of human sociality in a crumbling world.

Marking the quieter moments — whether genuine or deceptive — between major scenes are the nighttime passages. These feature vast expanses of black, wide shots illuminated only by gunfire or fires, where the previously benign yellow shifts to a threatening orange, almost red, raising the tension. The black backdrop becomes a space for confessions, where characters reveal vulnerabilities and share thoughts while the world outside burns, inflaming emotions before giving way to new, colorful daylight landscapes of death.

When humans lose, nature wins. Green swallows up asphalt, buildings, and any human-made structures deemed unnecessary for guerrilla warfare. The color of blooming grass evokes the past, offering rest and comfort, linking scenes where it appears to a sense of melancholy. This is not new for post-apocalyptic sci-fi, particularly since The Last of Us (video game, Naughty Dog, 2013) depicted one of many “worlds after the end.” Nature reclaiming spaces on a deserted Earth is a sublime and unsettling representation of forces greater than human concerns. A car speeding through trees feels “normal” yet hides danger behind every turn, while grass swallows a disused gas station in the background.
 

The high-contrast gray scale of black-and-white film captures the real country — one falling apart, documented for posterity, where humanity lives day-to-day with a destiny marked by defeat. Jessie, the protagonist, shows her home — the car in which she travels hundreds of miles with Lee (Kirsten Dunst), Joel (Wagner Moura), and Sammy (Stephen McKinley Henderson). They experience and capture family dynamics through a camera that demands time and patience. The girl matures emotionally, and her perspective on the world evolves, culminating in a finale whose climax delivers the only outcome possible from the beginning.

In this world where color variations distinguish between personal and collective joy and sorrow, everyday life teaches that one never truly becomes accustomed to death. To convey trauma, Garland employs forced silences (from the actors) combined with jarring music or the deafening sounds of battle. Horror is omnipresent: on one side, boys kill for sport; on the other, someone washes away human remains. Yet even in the daily life of a world likely in its final chapter, magic can still happen: wild flames can become fireflies, and it’s still possible to enter a store and smile genuinely, even if the American flag now bears only two stars.