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The new Bollywood action-adventure “War” is probably only for fans of marquee-topping actors Hrithik Roshan and Tiger Shroff , the former of whom stars in the goony but likable superhero series “Krrish” and the latter of whom will star in an upcoming, officially licensed Indian Rambo remake. Stylistically, “War” is Maximum Masala, and maybe features more tonal shifts and berserk plot twists and convolutions than even established Indian film buffs can handle.

“War” features: a couple of good-enough musical numbers; “ Top Gun ”-levels of homoeroticism, intended or otherwise; way too much who-is-the-mole intrigue; a superfluous romantic sub-plot that dove-tails with a random Christmas scene involving a cute widdle kid; an entertaining motorcycle chase where the two dueling stars link arms and spin around like computer-graphics-enhanced dervishes; an endearingly sappy plot tangent involving the mother of Shroff’s character; and a show-stopping church-set hammer fight that follows a sports-car chase across a frozen river. Many muscle shirts, computer-graphics artists, and wind machines were put to great and terrible use on this movie. Thankfully, established Desi/Bollywood fans may find that “War” rewards more than it tests their patience (barely, but still). 

Roshan and Shroff play Kabir and Khalid, respectively, two smoldering Indian anti-terrorist spies who are out to nab evil international arms dealer/terrorist Rizwan Ilyasi (Sanjeev Vasta), who looks weirdly like Geoffrey Rush cosplaying as Fran Leibowitz, dressed as he in red circular-framed glasses, cream-colored khakis, and white pinstriped jacket. But before Kabir and Khalid set off to catch Vasta’s flamboyant-looking, but barely-developed baddie, the two leads take a while to size each other up. Which makes sense since “War” is basically structured like a bonkers “Marvel Team-Up” jam session, only starring two of Bollywood’s biggest contemporary stars instead of Spider-Man and Ben Grimm. 

Kabir doesn’t want to work with Khalid, not even after a (genuinely fun) establishing action scene where Khalid disarms a room full of drug-dealers in what looks like one long take. A pair of sudsy reasons are given for Kabir’s on sight enmity—Khalid’s dad betrayed his country! Also: Khalid has bad peripheral vision!—but these are obviously just excuses to get Roshan and Shroff to give each other sexy looks, declare their love for India, and dance together (it’s an okay dance number, mind you, but both stars have done better).

The same is basically true about, oh, all of the immaterial plot. Two handsome leading men, both of whom amass bloody scars across their chiseled cheek bones and jawlines, must work together despite their mutual fear of betrayal. Never mind Kabir’s hetero-romantic sub-plot with single mom Naina ( Vaani Kapoor ), a civilian asset who becomes reluctantly involved with Kabir’s plan to catch Ilyasi; Kabir and Naina’s romance is tellingly only emphasized at the start of the film’s post-intermission second half. “War” frequently promises and sometimes delivers a series of over-the-top confrontations between Roshan and Shroff, the latter of whom goes to weird lengths to make Roshan seem like the sturdier of the two stars (Shroff pouts a lot , is all I’ll say). 

Fans of Roshan and Shroff will probably flock to “War” for a handful of fun, gonzo set pieces that are immodestly dispersed throughout a litany of densely over-written, meagerly thought-through dialogue scenes. Both types of scenes can be fun. I’m rather partial to a later scene where Kabir retro-actively explains, through a series of flashbacks, the underlying method to his investigation’s maddening trajectory. So while the “four invisible chess pieces” metaphor that Kabir uses to both explain and applaud himself is gibberish, the montage that’s used to illustrate Kabir’s insane plan is as dynamic and goofy as the explanatory kicker at the end of a satisfyingly pulpy whodunit. If you’re going to “War,” you should probably go expecting some high-toned nonsense. 

“War” works best when it’s a Michael Bay-goes-Bollywood take on the “ Mission: Impossible ” films. What makes this a dicey proposition (for some): there’s a lot more “ Mission: Impossible II ”—and the “Heroic Bloodshed” spirit of John Woo , that sequel’s director—in this movie than I suspect many readers will care for. An out-of-left field bungee-jumping scene ends with one hero nervously walking away from oncoming cops after the other guy swings around a bridge and swan-dives into the water below. This scene is nutty, and not altogether well-made, but its creators’ dedication to flamboyant excess will be appreciated by fans.

My only warning for those who are interested in “War”: don’t go in expecting a smooth ride. There’s too much narrative padding and only some of it is the good kind of silly. There have been crazier Indian action movies this year (“Saaho” being the most recent) and more effective spy-thrillers, too (“India’s Most Wanted,” of all things). But “War” is satisfying for what it is: a star vehicle that’s too weird to be dismissed, and too plodding to completely work.

Simon Abrams

Simon Abrams is a native New Yorker and freelance film critic whose work has been featured in  The New York Times ,  Vanity Fair ,  The Village Voice,  and elsewhere.

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154 minutes

Hrithik Roshan

Tiger Shroff

Vaani Kapoor

Ashutosh Rana

Dipannita Sharma

Anupriya Goenka

Keith Dallison

R. Bhakti Klein

Miguel Cirillo as Dinesh

• Siddharth Anand

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• Shridhar Raghavan
• Abbas Tyrewala

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• Vishal Dadlani
• Shekhar Ravjiani

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It’s a juicy proposition for fanboys and girls of both actors. A sort of millennial throwback to the 90s showdown between Sanjay Dutt and Jackie Shroff in Subhash Ghai's 'Khalnayak'.

War Movie Review: Lot of style, stunts and show, but lacks a solid storyline

• Times of India

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War | Song - Jai Jai Shivshankar

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raghu6300386775 raghu 113 873 days ago

Stylish making and grand action.

shivnathkumar 940 days ago

Vishalsingh 966 days ago, avigyan chakrabarti 1006 days ago.

I have to admit this that War is one of the finest Indian action films of the year! The film is not for a second slow or boring, and despite the long duration never feels dragged. Plus, it's jam-packed with nonstop action and some really surprising twists that make it a spellbinding action thriller. Also the movie features my favourite superstars like Hrithik Roshan and Tiger Shroff. The movie featured many stunts, which makes it an interesting movie too.

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• This film marks the first collaboration of uncle-nephew duo Anil Kapoor and Arjun Kapoor. Arjun is the son of Anil’s brother Boney Kapoor. Share
• This film marks the first collaboration of uncle-nephew duo Anil Kapoor and Arjun Kapoor. Arjun is the son of Anil’s brother Boney Kapoor.
• This is the second time Arjun Kapoor is playing a double role, the first being Aurangzeb (2013).
• The song ‘Yamma yamma’ from ‘Shaan’ is sampled in the song ‘Partywali Night' for the film.

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Indian agent Khalid goes on a mission to hunt and eliminate his former mentor, the country's top agent Kabir who has gone rogue. A deadly war begins. Indian agent Khalid goes on a mission to hunt and eliminate his former mentor, the country's top agent Kabir who has gone rogue. A deadly war begins. Indian agent Khalid goes on a mission to hunt and eliminate his former mentor, the country's top agent Kabir who has gone rogue. A deadly war begins.

• Siddharth Anand
• Aditya Chopra
• Shridhar Raghavan
• Hrithik Roshan
• Tiger Shroff
• Vaani Kapoor
• 636 User reviews
• 36 Critic reviews
• 25 wins & 19 nominations

• Major Kabir Dhaliwal

• Captain Khalid Rahmani

• Naina Verma

• Colonel Sunil Luthra

• Aditi Nahta

• Firoze Contractor
• Rizwan Iiyasi

• Dr. Mallika Singhal

• Khalid's mother

• Dr. Utpal Biswas
• Lieutenant colonel Jimmy Shroff

• Rock Thrower
• Raziwan's Bodyguard
• School Bully 1
• All cast & crew
• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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• Trivia Hrithik Roshan signed the film on a condition that Tiger Shroff should be cast in the other role.
• Goofs For selection in Army candidate has to go through complete medical test therefore during his medical examination they must have notice his defect in peripheral vision and he would not have been selected for army in first place.

Khalid : No one knows Kabir like I do. I can guess his next move. I understand him.

• Connections Featured in 65th Amazon Filmfare Awards (2020)
• Soundtracks Ghungroo Vocals by Arijit Singh & Shilpa Rao Lyrics by Kumaar Mixed by Vijay Dayal Mastered by Donal Whelan Music by Vishal Dadlani & Shekhar Ravjiani

User reviews 636

• Oct 26, 2019
• How long is War? Powered by Alexa
• When is War due to release in the U.S.A.? How do I find screening locations?
• October 2, 2019 (United States)
• Official site (Japan)
• Official Website.
• Lisbon, Portugal
• Betterfly Films
• Reverie Entertainment
• Yash Raj Films
• See more company credits at IMDbPro
• $21,000,000 (estimated)
• Oct 6, 2019
• $67,179,155

Technical specs

• Runtime 2 hours 31 minutes
• IMAX 6-Track
• AGA Sound System
• Dolby Digital
• Dolby Atmos

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War movie review: Hrithik Roshan-Tiger Shroff drama is high on action, low on story

War movie review: with swag, style and sass in abundance, where is the substance in hrithik roshan and tiger shroff’s new film.

War Director - Siddharth Anand Cast - Hrithik Roshan, Tiger Shroff, Vaani Kapoor

War has swag, style and sass in abundance, and comes peppered with high-octane action scenes, car-and-bike chases and jaw-dropping series of twists. What else do you expect from a film that has Hrithik Roshan and Tiger Shroff as the lead pair?

Directed by Siddharth Anand, War is an espionage thriller that serves you with just the right amount of action, humour and tops it with ridiculously good-looking people. However, don’t expect too much from story because with two bonafide action stars fighting it out on the big screen, everything else is secondary.

War opens with Kabir ( Hrithik Roshan ), a rogue agent, killing his own. Through a flashback sequence, it is established how he met Khalid ( Tiger Shroff ) who went on to join his unit in an intelligence agency. Story takes an interesting turn when Khalid, who has always worshipped Kabir as his mentor, is assigned the task of finding and arresting him. Khalid is also supposed to find out why Kabir went bad and another flashback sequence post intermission reveals his reasons.

Watch War public review

Throughout War, Hrithik and Tiger’s onscreen camaraderie is on point. It is the USP of the film — just as makers intended. Each frame where the two appear together receives whistles and cheers from fans. Whether they’re fighting or dancing, or just flaunting their six-pack abs and chiselled bodies — it’s nothing short of a visual treat. The best aspect of War is that no actor is aiming for one-upmanship, instead you see them feeding off each other’s energy. There’s a pleasant comic vibe, too, between Hrithik and Tiger and director Siddharth Anand uses it cleverly without it sounding awkward.

Hrithik — Bollywood’s resident Greek god, unapologetically flaunts his age and swag. You’d love those wrinkles. Tiger — the hot favourite among youth — delivers an honest performance even though he seems absolutely star struck by his reel and real life mentor. But who’s complaining?

Unfortunately, War doesn’t give any scope to its female lead to perform. Vaani Kapoor only appears in the film in its second half, and before you can even understand what her role in the plot is, she disappears. The 20-minute forced cameo, with a song thrown in, doesn’t impress one bit. Vaani’s role seems to be limited to adding glamour to the film. It’s sad that even in today’s day and age, that’s what many filmmakers cast female actors in their film for.

And you’ll feel the same for supporting actors too. Fine performers such as Ashutosh Rana and Soni Razdan are wasted in War, even though they somewhat justify their screen time with whatever little comes their way. Anupriya Goenka, however, does make her presence felt.

The one element that you get in abundance in War is beautifully-choreographed action. The first half has these sequences in plenty and it only gets better in the second half. Shot at exotic international locales like Morocco and Portugal, as well as Delhi and Kerala, the film excels in the action department. War gives a callback to action extravaganzas such as Mission Impossible and Fast & Furious, and Hrithik’s earlier outings Dhoom 2 and Bang Bang.

Amid all this, you wonder what happened to the story if at all there was any. Just like we had Saaho a month back which was all things action but no story, War too makes you question why filmmakers don’t put enough thought into having a substantial plot. War suffers from a relatively weak screenplay that does not go unnoticed as the two good-looking actors overshadow everything else.

Also, no matter which genre a film belongs too, if it’s Bollywood, you can’t do without songs. However, we have no complaints as it is a treat to watch Tiger and Hrithik dancing together. Jai Jai Shivshankar might seem like it came out of nowhere but when these two show you their moves, you just can’t enough of them.

War, a big spectacle film, is definitely worth a watch for the sheer joy of seeing this dream pair of Hrithik and Tiger on the silver screen.

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Common sense media reviewers.

Slick Bollywood action thriller has bloody violence.

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

Loyalty, honor, trust, and courage are key themes.

Many of the characters are driven by patriotism. B

Very violent scenes. Fist fights resulting in brok

Brief fast-forwarded CCTV footage of a couple in b

One use of "s--t."

Musical sequence is shot at a lavish party. Brand

Character smokes a cigar. Characters sip wine in o

Parents need to know that War is a violent but thrilling Bollywood Hindi-language action movie -- subtitled in English -- that deals with issues of patriotism, loyalty, and family. The movie has two dance sequences that break up the stylized violence that occurs when two special forces agents -- played by…

Positive Messages

Loyalty, honor, trust, and courage are key themes. Patriotism and justice are also paramount. Some double-crossing and misdirection.

Positive Role Models

Many of the characters are driven by patriotism. But a character also learns to love their family as much as their country.

Violence & Scariness

Very violent scenes. Fist fights resulting in broken bones. Stabbings in various body parts, including the neck and hands. Characters are shot in the body and head, sometimes with CGI blood splatter. A character is about to be publicly stoned to death but is saved. Another is tortured and beaten. A schoolchild is beaten by fellow pupils. Someone is thrown from a height and is shown dead with blood pooling from their head. Lots of car crashes and explosions. Poisoned character has blood coming from mouth.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Sex, Romance & Nudity

Brief fast-forwarded CCTV footage of a couple in bed together. Some bikini-clad characters during a party scene. There are some homoerotic undertones between the two main characters.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.

Products & Purchases

Musical sequence is shot at a lavish party. Brand logos visible throughout movie.

Drinking, Drugs & Smoking

Character smokes a cigar. Characters sip wine in one scene. Song lyric about getting "tipsy."

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that War is a violent but thrilling Bollywood Hindi-language action movie -- subtitled in English -- that deals with issues of patriotism, loyalty, and family. The movie has two dance sequences that break up the stylized violence that occurs when two special forces agents -- played by Bollywood superstars Hrithik Roshan and Tiger Shroff -- face off. Although unsaid, there appears to be a distinct sexual chemistry between the two male leads. Fight scenes are visceral, with bone-crunching impact shots. There are also lots of gun and knife fights, with bloody but not gory results. The characters hold patriotism above all else, with honor and loyalty a close second. A character also learns to value family love. Special forces generally kill enemies rather than arrest them. Set in the real world, the Indian special forces are tracking down an ISIS target. There is a brief shot of CCTV footage of two characters in bed together. Parties in the movies are lavish idealized visions of wealth and high-end brand logos are visible throughout the movie. A song features a lyric about getting "tipsy." A character smokes a cigar and two characters sip wine. There is one use of the word "s--t." A character is described as being like a god or an idol to another. The movie begins with a disclaimer that states it does not wish to offend any religion, caste, or race. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

Where to Watch

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Community Reviews

• Parents say (3)
• Kids say (2)

Based on 3 parent reviews

War is a entertaining action thrill ride that contains graphic cinematic violence and explicit scenes

What's the story.

In WAR, after a failed mission, elite Indian special forces agent Kabir ( Hrithik Roshan ) goes rogue. In response, rookie agent Khalid ( Tiger Shroff ) is set on a violent globetrotting mission to track down his former mentor.

Is It Any Good?

Violently smashing together the most iconic elements of '80s and '90s Hollywood with Hong Kong action cinema and repackaging with modern effects and audience expectations, War is a tour de force. Presented -- where available -- in stunning 4K, the camera loves stars Roshan and Shroff, perhaps as much as they love each other, as suggested by the distinct, yet unsaid, homoerotic undertones. Their smouldering performances are exactly what this kind of big, brash, and bombastic movie needs. The violence is suitably bone-crunching and thrilling, mixing the frenetic action of John Woo 's explosive Hong Kong crime movies with the best of James Bond , with white-knuckle action taking place in exotic locations across the world. The film's score is also a highlight, raising a smile whenever the gigantic main theme tune kicks in.

Like the gung-ho Hollywood movies that inspired War , the movie's politics can be seen as questionable depending on the viewer's take on patriotism and a take-no-prisoners approach to national security. However, it balances it out slightly with the inclusion of love interest Naina ( Vaani Kapoor ) who offers a glimpse at a love beyond one's country. Punctuated by a couple of glossy musical numbers, War is a great-looking movie that throws just enough inventiveness into its big theatrical action pieces to make it a successful mission.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about the violence in War . How did it make you feel? Did it feel necessary to the story? Do some types of media violence have different impact than others?

How is patriotism displayed in the movie? Should people love their country above all else? What are the positives and negatives of patriotism?

Talk about the relationship between Kabir and Khalid. How is Kabir a mentor to Khalid? Do you have a mentor? What is the benefit of having one? Do you think there is anything more to Kabir and Khalid's relationship?

Discuss how music and dancing is an integral part to Bollywood movies. Does it add or detract to the entertainment?

Movie Details

• In theaters : October 2, 2019
• On DVD or streaming : November 28, 2019
• Cast : Hrithik Roshan , Tiger Shroff , Vaani Kapoor
• Director : Siddharth Anand
• Inclusion Information : Indian/South Asian actors
• Studio : Yash Raj Films
• Genre : Action/Adventure
• Topics : Friendship , Music and Sing-Along
• Character Strengths : Courage , Integrity
• Run time : 154 minutes
• MPAA rating : NR
• Last updated : October 8, 2022

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War movie review: Hrithik Roshan starrer is flashy but familiar

War movie review: the chief trouble with war is that all the space is divvied up between hrithik roshan and tiger shroff, that the poor baddies don’t really get a chance..

War movie cast: Hrithik Roshan, Tiger Shroff, Ashutosh Rana, Vaani Kapoor, Anupriya Goenka War movie director: Siddharth Anand War movie rating : Two stars

What do you expect when you have the two most beautifully-muscled, elastic bods in Bollywood playing I spy in a Yashraj movie?

Every frame bristling with the combined smirk-and-swag of Hrithik-Tiger? Check. Lavish locations all around the world? Present and accounted for. Lots of fast-paced chases? War has all of the above, and yet, it’s in the not quite there zone. Not quite smart enough, and most importantly, not quite new enough.

The set-up has promise. Agent Kabir (Roshan) who is a patriot to beat all desh-bhakts, has gone rogue. Former star-struck pupil Agent Khalid (Shroff) is assigned by chief spymaster (Rana) to track Kabir, and the cat-and-mouse chase, of one man on the tail of another, is as old as the spy saga itself. Veteran movie spies like Bond and Bourne and their minders have to work very hard to keep us glued with newer, flashier plot devices, spiffier toys and yes, deadlier enemies. In War, you can see the twists coming a mile off.

War’s insistence on being a family entertainer leads it towards the predictable template of song-and-dance, played-for-laughs dialogue-baazi-in-fights, teary mothers and loving sons. A rumbustious Holi dance in the middle of a remote outpost gives our lads, who move like greased lightning, a chance to shake their admirable booties. But it also makes us roll our eyes, which would be fine if the film was in full-on comic book mode. But of course, it’s not.

All the space is gobbled up by Hrithik and Tiger, and they are so busy strutting across the screen, in all their glory, so ripped, so brawny, that the poor baddies don’t really get a chance. Not one scary villain who sends the shivers down our spines? Then the spies might as well be playing ring-around-the-roses with each other.

Scads full of cash must have been needed to take the cast from as diverse places as Portugal to Sydney to Kerala, and there’s no been stinting there. But a story with freshness and zing? Missing in action. It talks of the ‘desh ke dushman’ as did movies of the 70s and 80s; dated dialogues which combine ‘Musalmaan’ and ‘vatanparasti’ only add to the casual bigotry which is becoming common parlance these days.

The girls, Vaani Kapoor as a lissome dancer, and Anupriya Goel as an ace code-cracker, get some air-time, but it’s the boys who have all the fun: falling off choppers, zooming about in fast cars, diving off bridges, getting in some bloody fisticuff-time. Shroff shouldn’t ever team up with Roshan again though; on his own, Tiger is a dream dancer with jaw-dropping moves, and can take on five hundred armed desperadoes; when Hrithik is around, though, he recedes into the background.

The last time Hrithik looked as sexy, was in Dhoom 2 (2006), also a Yashraj film. The golden streaks have been replaced with a bit of grey at the temples, but the bronzed cheekbones decorated with a few fetching scars, the fighting-fit figure in fatigues-and-dark-glasses and the case-hardened look, is full eye-candy. I’m not revealing anything by telling you that War looks all set to be a franchise: next time maybe go complete comic-book silly? Now that’s a spy I will buy.

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• Hrithik Roshan
• Tiger Shroff

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MOVIE REVIEW: ऋतिक और टाइगर श्रॉफ की फिल्म 'वॉर' देखने की सोच रहे हैं तो पहले रिव्यू पढ़ें

War movie review: ऋतिक रोशन और टाइगर श्रॉफ की फिल्म 'वॉर' आज सिनेमाघरों में रिलीज हो गई. अपने एक्शन सीक्वेंस की वजह से ये फिल्म काफी चर्चा में है. अगर आप भी देखने की सोच रहे हैं तो पहले रिव्यू पढ़ें.

फिल्म- वॉर स्टारकास्ट- ऋतिक रोशन, टाइगर श्रॉफ, वाणी कपूर डायरेक्टर- सिद्धार्थ आनंद रेटिंग: ***

War Movie Review:  फिल्म में दर्शक का हमेशा एक साइड होता है. वो हीरो के साथ होता है और विलेन से नफरत करता है. लेकिन जब आपके दोनों हीरो ही एक दूसरे से 'वॉर' करें तो फिर आप किधर होंगे. कुछ पिटने वाले से हमदर्दी दिखाएंगे तो कुछ पीटने वाले से प्यार...'वॉर' के  मे कर्स ने दर्शकों की इसी नब्ज को पकड़ा है. फिल्म में फोकस कहानी पर नहीं बल्कि सिर्फ एक्शन पर है. लेकिन दर्शक इसी कहानी में खुद को कभी इधर तो कभी उधर ढूढता है. इसी वजह से फिल्म की कहानी कुछ खास ना होते हुए भी ये 'वॉर' शानदार लगती है.

सालों समय बाद कोई ऐसी फिल्म आई है जिसमें बॉलीवुड के दो बड़े दिग्गज एक्शन स्टार्स बराबर स्क्रीन शेयर करते दिखे हैं. मेकर्स का दावा था कि हिंदी सिनेमा में दर्शकों ने ऐसा एक्शन नहीं देखा होगा और ये फिल्म अपने इस वादे पर खरी उतरती है. ऋतिक और टाइगर की जोड़ी कमाल की है. चाहें डांस की बात हो या फिर एक्शन दृश्यों की ये दोनों सितारे एक दूसरे से कहीं भी कमतर नहीं लगे हैं.  अगर आप भी फिल्म देखने की सोच रहे हैं तो आइए जानते हैं कि इस फिल्म में आपको लिए क्या खास है-

जैसा की बाकी हिंदी फिल्मों में होता है. यहा भी वही कहानी है. देश को बचाने की जिम्मेदारी इन्हीं दोनों एक्टर्स के कंधे पर है. एजेंट कबीर (ऋतिक रोशन) को पता चलता है कि देश पर बड़ा आंतकी हमला होने वाला है. वो मिशन पर जाता है लेकिन वहां अचानकर कुछ ऐसा पता चलता है जिसकी वजह से वो अपने ही लोगों का दुश्मन बन जाता है. उसके बाद खालिद (टाइगर श्रॉफ) को ये मिशन दिया जाता है कि वो कबीर को मार दे. इसके बाद ही शुरु होता है दोनों के बीच वॉर. ऐसी क्या वजह है जो कबीर अपने ही लोगों को मारने पर उतारु हो गया है? क्या खिलाद अपने मिशन में कामयाब हो पाता है. यही क्लाइमैक्स और कहानी है.

इससे पहले 'सुपर 30' में ऋतिक रोशन का डी-ग्लैम अवतार दिखाई दिया था लेकिन सच यही है कि ऋतिक एक्शन फिल्मों के लिए बने है. इस फिल्म में ऋतिक पूरे फॉर्म में हैं. फिल्म में ऋतिक के ऐसे बहुत सारे एक्शन सीन्स हैं जिन्हें देखकर आप दिल थाम लेंगे. हिंदी सिनेमा ने एक एजेंट की छवि दर्शकों के मन में ऐसी ही बनाई है कि जिसकी बॉडी अच्छी हो, वो 20-40 लोगों को एक साथ मारकर गिरा सके, वो कहीं भी सुपरमैन जैसे पहुंच जाए और कभी-कभी शर्टलेस हो तो देखकर लोगों की आहें निकल जाएं... और इस मामले में ऋतिक फिल्म में बिल्कुल परफेक्ट हैं.

वहीं, टाइगर श्रॉफ को लेकर हमेशा ये चर्चा रहती है कि वो एक्शन के मामले में ऋतिक के नक्शेकदम पर चल रहे हैं. इस फिल्म को लेकर दिलचस्पी इसीलिए बढ़ गई थीं क्योंकि जब दो एक्शन स्टार्स एक साथ आएंगे तो क्या होगा. टाइगर कहीं भी फिल्म में ऋतिक से कमतर नहीं लगे हैं. इस फिल्म में एक्शन के साथ उनकी पर्सनैलिटी के कई शेड्स देखने को मिला है. ऋतिक के साथ उनकी जोड़ी दमदार है. दोनों जब एक साथ पर्दे पर आते हैं तो लगता है मजा आ जाता है.

इसमें वाणी कपूर भी हैं. उनका रोल काफी छोटा है. फिल्म में उनके हिस्से एक गाना आया है 'घुंघरू टूट गए'. उनके पास इस फिल्म में करने के लिए ज्यादा कुछ नहीं है. यहां तक कि फिल्म खत्म होने के बाद उनका रोल याद भी नहीं रहता.

इसे सिद्धार्थ आनंद ने डायरेक्ट किया है. फिल्म की कहानी आदित्य चोपड़ा के साथ मिलकर सिद्धार्थ आनंद ने ही लिखी है. इसमें कोई शक नहीं कि एक्शन सीक्वेंस काफी शानदार हैं. उन्हें फिल्माने में जो मेहनत की गई है वो पर्दे पर भव्य नज़र भी आता है. लेकिन कुछ कमियां भी हैं जो खलती हैं. ये फिल्म करीब 2 घंटे 36 मिनट की है. इसमें कहानी कई जगह बहुत ढ़ीली लगती है. ऐसा लगता है कि जाना कहीं और है लेकिन डायरेक्टर ने शॉर्ट कट की बजाय लंबा रास्ता चुन लिया है. फिल्म बुहत लाउड है. फिल्म में जो जो गाने हैं उनकी कोई जरूरत नहीं लगती. लेकिन चुकि हिंदी सिनेमा ने अपना ये परंपरागत ढर्रा बना लिया है कि फिल्म में गाना जरुर रखेंगे.

इन दिनों वन लाइनर डायलॉग्स की चलन है लेकिन इस फिल्म में ऐसा एक डायलॉग भी नहीं है. जो हैं वो बहुत भारी भरकम हैं. जैसे 'आदमी पहाड़ से टकरा सकता है लेकिन परवरिश से नहीं.'

क्यों देखें/ना देखें

पिछले दिनों साल की सबसे बड़ी एक्शन फिल्म का दावा 'साहो' के मेकर्स ने किया. 'बाहुबली' के बाद प्रभाष की इस फिल्म को दर्शक बर्दाश्त नहीं कर पाए. ऐसे में ऋतिक और टाइगर की ये जोड़ी आपके पिछले दर्द पर मरहम लगाने आई है. ये दोनों इसमें कमाल के है. ये जब भी साथ आते हैं तो दिल जीत लेते हैं, तो अगर आपको एक्शन फिल्में पसंद हैं तो वाकई आप इसे मिस ना करें. लेकिन अगर आप एक्शन नहीं देखते तो बिल्कुल भी ट्राई ना करें, ये फिल्म बहुत लाउड है. आपको पसंद नहीं आएगी.

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War (Hindi)

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3 /5 Filmibeat

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War Cast & Crew

War Crew Info

War critics review, war trailer.

• Title Track Singers: Lyricist: 3.1
• Ghungroo Singers: Arijit Singh , Shilpa Rao Lyricist: 3
• Jai Jai Shivshankar Singers: Vishal Dadlani , Benny Dayal Lyricist: 3.3
• War Theme Singers: Lyricist: 3.1
• Kabir's Theme Singers: Lyricist: 3.6
• Khalid's Theme Singers: Lyricist: 3.3

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About War

In this War film, Hrithik Roshan , Tiger Shroff played the primary leads.

The War was released in theaters on 02 Oct 2019.

The War was directed by Siddharth Anand

Movies like Article 370 , Laapataa Ladies , Welcome To The Jungle and others in a similar vein had the same genre but quite different stories.

The soundtracks and background music were composed by Vishal Dadlani, Shekhar Ravjiani for the movie War.

The cinematography for War was shot by Benjamin Jasper .

The movie War belonged to the Action,Drama,Thriller, genre.

War User Review

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Priyanka 1652 Days Ago

In simple words, War is an almost perfect Popcorn Entertainment movie. So everyone please watch.......................................................................

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Civil War (English)

Release date: 19 april, 2024, civil war (english) movie.

CIVIL WAR is the story of a group of journalists in a war zone. In the near future, a civil war erupts between an authoritarian United States government, headed by a dictatorial President (Nick Offerman) and various secessionist movements like Western Forces, Florida Alliance, New People's Army etc. Renowned war ...  photographer Lee Smith (Kirsten Dunst) is in New York covering the events of the war. She and his colleague Joel (Wagner Moura) plan to go to Washington DC to interview the President before the Western Forces take over the city. They are joined by veteran war journalist and mentor Sammy (Stephen McKinley Henderson) and a 23-year-old aspiring photojournalist Jessie Cullen (Cailee Spaeny). Lee had saved Jessie's life during a protest in New York. Lee is not in favour of Jessie joining them but Joel insists on taking her after she charms him. The 600-mile-plus journey begins. On the way, they encounter several challenges and also dangers. What happens next forms the rest of the film.

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Political War Hindi Movie

Political War is a 2024 Indian movie directed by Mukesh Modi and Vivek Srivastava starring Rituparna Sengupta, Prashant Narayanan, Seema Biswas and Milind Gunaji. The feature film is produced by Mukesh Modi

Directors: Mukesh Modi, Vivek Srivastava Producer: Mukesh Modi

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Home » Reviews » Hollywood Movie Reviews

Civil War Movie Review: Alex Garland Returns With A24’s Biggest Film, But The Film’s Refusal To Examine Its Characters And World Makes It Empty

Civil war chooses not to take sides when contrasting its plot to real-world politics, but it also refuses to substitute those elements for anything else, making the film quite shallow in the process.

Star Cast: Kirsten Dunst , Wagner Moura, Cailee Spaeny, Stephen McKinley Henderson, Sonoya Mizuno, and Nick Offerman

Director: Alex Garland

What’s Good: Garland’s direction is still as sublime as before, conjuring great visuals and a powerful atmosphere.

What’s Bad: The film lacks context for its world and characters; only the most superficial remnants of conflict and motivation propel them forward.

Loo Break: The film has a very paper-thin plot, so you can skip some of the vignettes and still get everything the movie is trying to say, which is not much.

Watch or Not?: Like Garland’s films, Civil War is still quite enjoyable and will ignite conversation.

Language: English (with subtitles).

Available At: Theaters

Runtime: 109 Minutes.

Alex Garland is undoubtedly one of the most exciting filmmakers of the 21st century, and his career, as his films, has been anything but orthodox, having started as a novelist to jump into writing films and then directing them. Civil War, his latest cinematic effort, pulls from everything Garland has done in the past, and while his ability to craft powerful atmospheres and enchanting visuals is still there, Garland has been losing the thread when it comes to telling captivating stories.

Civil War Movie Review: Script Analysis

Civil War could be considered a piece of speculative fiction, in the same vein as something like “The Man in the High Castle,” a novel written by Philip K. Dick, where World War II went the opposite way for the Allies and left a defeated USA divided by its conquerors; The Nazi, and the Japanese Empire. Like that by Philip K. Dick, Garland tries to transport us to another reality where the USA is suffering a second civil war, changing the landscape of the country forever once again, with states like California and Texas becoming allies and fighting against the established government.

This idea sounds perfect on paper, but sadly, Garland has chosen to not enter any details regarding how the reality of his film ended up in the situation. Instead, the movie is, in fact, a character study centered around the character of Lee Smith, a photojournalist who is on a mission to get a picture of the President of the United States before he is killed or arrested. That is it. The movie wants to avoid dwelling on the world that the characters are living in, and it also refuses to examine the characters beyond a very surface level, so the result is a movie with nothing to say.

This is a double-edged sword because while the movie has nothing to say about anything, it serves as a canvas so the audience can fill the blank spaces with their biases. This results in many conversations about what the movie wants to say, its message, and its message, but in reality, the film only serves as a reflection of the audience. If that is the film’s point, it was successful, but that doesn’t make it a good movie either; it is just a concept with several ideas thrown at the screen without structure or purpose.

The setting and the concept of a modern civil war in the USA are wasted, as it doesn’t matter that the war is happening in that country. The movie could have done precisely what it does with its characters and story in any other place, and it wouldn’t have mattered at all. Without context for the world or the characters, the story lacks resonance, and it works mainly as a series of vignettes instead of a full-fleshed story. Of course, creating an actual fictional world that still manages to find a balance between sides of the conflict and being separated from real-world politics would be more challenging, but it would have been much more satisfying.

Civil War Movie Review: Star Performance

It is hard to talk about the characters in Civil War because they are so undefined, and this makes them incredibly superficial, which is sad because, in previous films like Ex Machina and Annihilation, Garland has proved that he can create compelling characters; here, these main characters are just glimpses of something, in this case, journalists, but they never act like journalists at all. Kirsten Dunst does excellently, but she never feels alive, and that is the point, as I believe that if the movie is about something, it is about journalism and desensitization in the media.

However, those themes are never developed, and the characters, like every other theme in the movie, are more of a footnote than something relevant to the plot or the story. In the end, Cailee Spaeny does the best at being a sort of surrogate for the audience, but there is so little to learn that her inclusion, other than proving that the cycle of violence never ends, feels wasted. Wagner Moura also does his best with a foolish and useless character. There are a lot of useless characters in this film.

Civil War Movie Review: Direction, Music

Garland made a splash with Ex Machina, a captivating science fiction film with gorgeous visual effects and a powerful atmosphere that took Garland to the Oscars, and he has been riding that wave ever since. The director’s best work is Annihilation, a movie that offers impressive visuals and performances, but since then, it seems Garland can only hit the visual department and not much else. In Civil War, Garland even stumbles regarding the visual aspect of the film because while this is A24’s most expensive film, it still feels too small for the story the film wants to tell.

The scale feels small, and the world never feels real in any shape or form. There are a couple of scenes with fabulous sound design, but nothing really matters because of a lack of context in these action scenes. Garland tries to save the film in its third act but fails to create a scenario that feels totally unrealistic and cheap in many ways. Garland didn’t know how to make the proper scale for the project, or maybe he didn’t have enough resources. In recent interviews, he has declared that he has fallen out of love with filmmaking, and this movie is proof of that; there is barely Ex Machina energy left in here.

Civil War Movie Review: The Last Word

Civil War is still a fascinating film, not because of what it says but because of what the people will say about it. Sadly, the film is incomplete and will need ideas from outside to give it any relevance. Garland might be taking a break from filmmaking, and he really needs it because he has been running on autopilot for his last two films. Dunst and Spaeny do great, and Henderson is the heart of the film, but because the characters are so paper thin, not much can be said about them. This is a proper miss.

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Civil War released on 19th April 2024.

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‘Civil War’ Review: We Have Met the Enemy and It Is Us. Again.

In Alex Garland’s tough new movie, a group of journalists led by Kirsten Dunst, as a photographer, travels a United States at war with itself.

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‘Civil War’ | Anatomy of a Scene

The writer and director alex garland narrates a sequence from his film..

“My name is Alex Garland and I’m the writer director of ‘Civil War’. So this particular clip is roughly around the halfway point of the movie and it’s these four journalists and they’re trying to get, in a very circuitous route, from New York to DC, and encountering various obstacles on the way. And this is one of those obstacles. What they find themselves stuck in is a battle between two snipers. And they are close to one of the snipers and the other sniper is somewhere unseen, but presumably in a large house that sits over a field and a hill. It’s a surrealist exchange and it’s surrounded by some very surrealist imagery, which is they’re, in broad daylight in broad sunshine, there’s no indication that we’re anywhere near winter in the filming. In fact, you can kind of tell it’s summer. But they’re surrounded by Christmas decorations. And in some ways, the Christmas decorations speak of a country, which is in disrepair, however silly it sounds. If you haven’t put away your Christmas decorations, clearly something isn’t going right.” “What’s going on?” “Someone in that house, they’re stuck. We’re stuck.” “And there’s a bit of imagery. It felt like it hit the right note. But the interesting thing about that imagery was that it was not production designed. We didn’t create it. We actually literally found it. We were driving along and we saw all of these Christmas decorations, basically exactly as they are in the film. They were about 100 yards away, just piled up by the side of the road. And it turned out, it was a guy who’d put on a winter wonderland festival. People had not dug his winter wonderland festival, and he’d gone bankrupt. And he had decided just to leave everything just strewn around on a farmer’s field, who was then absolutely furious. So in a way, there’s a loose parallel, which is the same implication that exists within the film exists within real life.” “You don’t understand a word I say. Yo. What’s over there in that house?” “Someone shooting.” “It’s to do with the fact that when things get extreme, the reasons why things got extreme no longer become relevant and the knife edge of the problem is all that really remains relevant. So it doesn’t actually matter, as it were, in this context, what side they’re fighting for or what the other person’s fighting for. It’s just reduced to a survival.”

By Manohla Dargis

A blunt, gut-twisting work of speculative fiction, “Civil War” opens with the United States at war with itself — literally, not just rhetorically. In Washington, D.C., the president is holed up in the White House; in a spookily depopulated New York, desperate people wait for water rations. It’s the near-future, and rooftop snipers, suicide bombers and wild-eyed randos are in the fight while an opposition faction with a two-star flag called the Western Forces, comprising Texas and California — as I said, this is speculative fiction — is leading the charge against what remains of the federal government. If you’re feeling triggered, you aren’t alone.

It’s mourning again in America, and it’s mesmerizingly, horribly gripping. Filled with bullets, consuming fires and terrific actors like Kirsten Dunst running for cover, the movie is a what-if nightmare stoked by memories of Jan. 6. As in what if the visions of some rioters had been realized, what if the nation was again broken by Civil War, what if the democratic experiment called America had come undone? If that sounds harrowing, you’re right. It’s one thing when a movie taps into childish fears with monsters under the bed; you’re eager to see what happens because you know how it will end (until the sequel). Adult fears are another matter.

In “Civil War,” the British filmmaker Alex Garland explores the unbearable if not the unthinkable, something he likes to do. A pop cultural savant, he made a splashy zeitgeist-ready debut with his 1996 best seller “The Beach,” a novel about a paradise that proves deadly, an evergreen metaphor for life and the basis for a silly film . That things in the world are not what they seem, and are often far worse, is a theme that Garland has continued pursuing in other dark fantasies, first as a screenwriter (“ 28 Days Later ”), and then as a writer-director (“ Ex Machina ”). His résumé is populated with zombies, clones and aliens, though reliably it is his outwardly ordinary characters you need to keep a closer watch on.

By the time “Civil War” opens, the fight has been raging for an undisclosed period yet long enough to have hollowed out cities and people’s faces alike. It’s unclear as to why the war started or who fired the first shot. Garland does scatter some hints; in one ugly scene, a militia type played by a jolting, scarily effective Jesse Plemons asks captives “what kind of American” they are. Yet whatever divisions preceded the conflict are left to your imagination, at least partly because Garland assumes you’ve been paying attention to recent events. Instead, he presents an outwardly and largely post-ideological landscape in which debates over policies, politics and American exceptionalism have been rendered moot by war.

‘Civil War’ Is Designed to Disturb You

One thing that remains familiar amid these ruins is the movie’s old-fashioned faith in journalism. Dunst, who’s sensational, plays Lee, a war photographer who works for Reuters alongside her friend, a reporter, Joel (the charismatic Wagner Moura). They’re in New York when you meet them, milling through a crowd anxiously waiting for water rations next to a protected tanker. It’s a fraught scene; the restless crowd is edging into mob panic, and Lee, camera in hand, is on high alert. As Garland’s own camera and Joel skitter about, Lee carves a path through the chaos, as if she knows exactly where she needs to be — and then a bomb goes off. By the time it does, an aspiring photojournalist, Jessie (Cailee Spaeny), is also in the mix.

The streamlined, insistently intimate story takes shape once Lee, Joel, Jessie and a veteran reporter, Sammy (Stephen McKinley Henderson), pile into a van and head to Washington. Joel and Lee are hoping to interview the president (Nick Offerman), and Sammy and Jessie are riding along largely so that Garland can make the trip more interesting. Sammy serves as a stabilizing force (Henderson fills the van with humanizing warmth), while Jessie plays the eager upstart Lee takes under her resentful wing. It’s a tidily balanced sampling that the actors, with Garland’s banter and via some cozy downtime, turn into flesh-and-blood personalities, people whose vulnerability feeds the escalating tension with each mile.

As the miles and hours pass, Garland adds diversions and hurdles, including a pair of playful colleagues, Tony and Bohai (Nelson Lee and Evan Lai), and some spooky dudes guarding a gas station. Garland shrewdly exploits the tense emptiness of the land, turning strangers into potential threats and pretty country roads into ominously ambiguous byways. Smartly, he also recurrently focuses on Lee’s face, a heartbreakingly hard mask that Dunst lets slip brilliantly. As the journey continues, Garland further sketches in the bigger picture — the dollar is near-worthless, the F.B.I. is gone — but for the most part, he focuses on his travelers and the engulfing violence, the smoke and the tracer fire that they often don’t notice until they do.

Despite some much-needed lulls (for you, for the narrative rhythm), “Civil War” is unremittingly brutal or at least it feels that way. Many contemporary thrillers are far more overtly gruesome than this one, partly because violence is one way unimaginative directors can put a distinctive spin on otherwise interchangeable material: Cue the artful fountains of arterial spray. Part of what makes the carnage here feel incessant and palpably realistic is that Garland, whose visual approach is generally unfussy, doesn’t embellish the violence, turning it into an ornament of his virtuosity. Instead, the violence is direct, at times shockingly casual and unsettling, so much so that its unpleasantness almost comes as a surprise.

If the violence feels more intense than in a typical genre shoot ’em up, it’s also because, I think, with “Civil War,” Garland has made the movie that’s long been workshopped in American political discourse and in mass culture, and which entered wider circulation on Jan. 6. The raw power of Garland’s vision unquestionably owes much to the vivid scenes that beamed across the world that day when rioters, some wearing T-shirts emblazoned with “ MAGA civil war ,” swarmed the Capitol. Even so, watching this movie, I also flashed on other times in which Americans have relitigated the Civil War directly and not, on the screen and in the streets.

Movies have played a role in that relitigation for more than a century, at times grotesquely. Two of the most famous films in history — D.W. Griffith’s 1915 racist epic “The Birth of a Nation” (which became a Ku Klux Klan recruitment tool) and the romantic 1939 melodrama “Gone With the Wind” — are monuments to white supremacy and the myth of the Southern Lost Cause. Both were critical and popular hits. In the decades since, filmmakers have returned to the Civil War era to tell other stories in films like “Glory,” “Lincoln” and “Django Unchained” that in addressing the American past inevitably engage with its present.

There are no lofty or reassuring speeches in “Civil War,” and the movie doesn’t speak to the better angels of our nature the way so many films try to. Hollywood’s longstanding, deeply American imperative for happy endings maintains an iron grip on movies, even in ostensibly independent productions. There’s no such possibility for that in “Civil War.” The very premise of Garland’s movie means that — no matter what happens when or if Lee and the rest reach Washington — a happy ending is impossible, which makes this very tough going. Rarely have I seen a movie that made me so acutely uncomfortable or watched an actor’s face that, like Dunst’s, expressed a nation’s soul-sickness so vividly that it felt like an X-ray.

Civil War Rated R for war violence and mass death. Running time: 1 hour 49 minutes. In theaters.

An earlier version of this review misidentified an organization in the Civil War in the movie. It is the Western Forces, not the Western Front.

How we handle corrections

Manohla Dargis is the chief film critic for The Times. More about Manohla Dargis

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'Civil War' Review: Kirsten Dunst’s film evokes gut-wrenching terror and numbness

Kirsten dunst's new film 'civil war' focusses on the aftermath of war and the impact it has on human lives. the film takes viewers on a journey through conflict zones and camps, providing an insight into what a potential civil war would mean in real terms..

Listen to Story

• Civil War is a war aftermath film by Alex Garland
• The film, starring Kirsten Dunst, has impressive combat sequences
• it leaves viewers with poignant, unanswered questions

Release Date: 19 Apr, 2024

'Civil War' focuses more on the aftermath of a war that affects human lives than on the war itself. It follows a group of journalists led by Lee Smith [Kirsten Dunst] as they travel from New York to Washington DC in an attempt to document the war and perhaps land an interview with the President. Through them, one encounters the consequences of war as they navigate conflict zones and camps.

What was the purpose of Alex Garland’s 'Civil War'? The writer-director, known for his keen interest in the sci-fi and fantasy genres, has shifted his focus to real-world problems. Staying true to his style, there are no easy answers in Garland’s 'Civil War.' There is no clear right or wrong side either. The narrative behind the war is simple: action and reaction. Who started it? Why are they at odds? These questions are of little significance because, using journalism as a subject, Garland provides insight into what a potential civil war would mean in real terms. Simply labeling this a war film would be unfair because, if anything, this film is not about the war itself. It encompasses everything that war brings along, including the unfathomable horrors it entails.

Civil War finds its protagonist in Lee aka Kirsten Dunst who delivers an impactful performance. The film also stars Cailee Spaeny, Stephen McKinley Henderson, and Nick Offerman. However, it is Jesse Plemons who, despite a rather shorter role, leaves you impressed as a militia leader.

The film will impress you with its combat sequences. However, the use of stills instead of authentic handheld camera work might bother a few who are ardent fans of these genres. The overall sound effect in the film is quite fantastic. The ear-deafening sound throughout gunfire gives you quite the chills, also providing a more realistic experience for cinema goers.

Through Lee’s prism, you experience the horrors and numbness of the civil war, which could very well become a reality sometime in the future.

Technically, the film is a straight A Plus, but overall, the film leaves you with several poignant questions, answers to which are not straight. Watch 'Civil War' to feel the sting of a war-torn America and the consequences of it. 3.5 out 5 to 'Civil War'. Published By: shweta keshri Published On: Apr 19, 2024

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War Is Hell, Ain’t It?

For a movie that set off a firestorm with its trailer, Alex Garland’s ‘Civil War’ is surprisingly bereft of any major commentary—choosing instead to merely drop the viewer into a war zone and see what happens

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“What’s so civil about war, anyway?” asked Axl Rose back in 1990, when he and his band had the world’s ear. Nobody would accuse Guns N’ Roses of being a political act like, say, U2, but releasing a single that paid homage to Martin Luther King Jr. while critiquing America’s misadventures in Vietnam was a risky move, especially considering the core demographics of their fan base. For extra pop-cultural cred, “Civil War” sampled the villainous prison warden played by Strother Martin in 1967’s Cool Hand Luke , whose ominously drawled warning of “What we’ve got here is failure to communicate” became a sort of sinister catchphrase —a euphemism suggesting progressive rhetoric wrapped around authoritarian brutality like barbed wire. It’s less that Martin’s character is worried about being understood than that he doesn’t want his charges to talk back.

Alex Garland’s Civil War is a movie with a failure to communicate, though not for lack of trying; its maker understands the visual and rhetorical language of agitprop, but he has such a limited vocabulary as a dramatist—and such a narrow agenda as a provocateur—that it doesn’t matter. There is a significant difference between movies that are polarizing because they ask difficult questions and ones that are simply designed to be divisive, and Civil War belongs decisively in the second category. Not only does the film’s depiction of a near-future America smoldering in the wreckage of its own colliding kamikaze ideologies feel borrowed from a number of other sources, but it also rings hollow, precisely because its vision of violent social collapse is so derivative. In attempting to make a movie largely about the ethical dimension of image making—a dilemma experienced by a group of war correspondents wandering through a country that’s become its own private twilight zone—Garland succeeds mostly in exposing his own limitations. He’s a pulp merchant, a purveyor of high-toned exploitation trying his best to strip-mine an anxious election-year zeitgeist while there’s still time.

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Officially, Civil War is an original screenplay, just like 2014’s Ex Machina , the wryly funny, sexily technophobic Bluebeard riff that positioned him as, if not the new Stanley Kubrick, then at least a worthy pretender. Like a lot of successful genre filmmakers—including his countryman Christopher Nolan—Garland is an inveterate magpie, subsuming aesthetic and conceptual material from a range of sources into his own vision. And whatever one thinks of films like Annihilation or Men , they are movies with a vision—carefully engineered acts of world-building suffused with atmosphere and punctuated by striking, unsettling moments. Which is why it’s all the stranger that right from the very beginning the storytelling language of Civil War feels so totally borrowed, including a pair of brazen allusions tilting toward copycatting more than homage. The first is a prologue nodding to the opening of Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11 in which the president of the United States (Nick Offerman) nervously rehearses a none-too-convincing victory speech from behind barricaded doors; the more he talks about his government’s impending triumph over insurgent forces—specifically, a coalition led by the state governments of Florida and Texas—the more he looks and sounds like a cornered rat. The second reference is even more on the nose: At a rally in downtown New York City, a suicide bomber clad in an American flag ignites a booby-trapped backpack, resulting in carnage whose gory imagery and stylized, ear-ringing sound design are indebted to Alfonso Cuaron’s Children of Men .

It’s worth noting that Fahrenheit 9/11 and Children of Men are keynote works of what could be called post-9/11 cinema— an early-millennial period when both serious and satirical American filmmakers were aligned in trying to criticize (or, in Moore’s case, outright topple) the Dubya White House. With his smug frat-boy countenance and aides who dated back to Nixon, Bush II was the poster boy for “America: Fuck yeah” and a perfect symbolic scapegoat for filmmakers running the gamut from Gus Van Sant to Sacha Baron Cohen. Two decades later, Hollywood obviously still leans mostly to the left, but the terms of engagement have changed. One thing that Barack Obama and Donald Trump had in common was that while their presidencies were both lightning rods for extremist criticism, they didn’t yield much in the way of memorable or great cinema. The closest thing to a cogent popular political allegory in that period was the ever-reliable Purge franchise, which imagined a silent, seething majority perpetually counting down the hours until a preordained, murderous, insurrectionist return of the repressed.

There’s a potentially great, cathartic dark comedy to be made about the psychology of an event like the Capitol attack of January 6, or about the dangers of unchecked autocracy manifesting as common-sense, anti-woke populism (among his myriad outrageous policy moves, Offerman’s commander in chief apparently opted to gift himself with a third term). Garland, though, is not the guy to thread that particular needle: Where a director like Jordan Peele is able to channel seriousness through sketch-comedy absurdism (including Get Out ’s earlier and superior three-term president joke), Garland doubles down on the idea that he’s doing important work. The strain is palpable. In interviews, the director has explained that Civil War was originally written before January 6 but that the shadow of the insurrection still fell over the production; talking to Dazed , he admitted that he could “detect [it] around the set” and that the bad vibes gave the production “a greater sense of anger.” It’s an interesting observation insofar as the finished film doesn’t so much seethe with rage as ooze a kind of cynical resignation—the sort that comes when a filmmaker either considers himself to be above his subject matter or isn’t being honest about his relationship to the material.

There’s certainly some kind of irony in a guy whose best work—2012’s Dredd , which Garland cowrote and produced with director Pete Travis—is an (exhilarating) exercise in hyperbolic carnage suddenly producing a sanctimonious statement against violence, but otherwise, Civil War doesn’t seem to come from a particularly personal place. Garland’s fascination with female protagonists over the years is laudable, but, as in Annihilation and Men , he can seem to conceive women only in terms of lack: The main character here is a veteran shutterbug named Lee Smith (Kirsten Dunst) who’s grown so inured to the sight of death and decay—and her role in sharing it with an increasingly information-starved public—that she’s basically a zombie. If that’s not enough of a cliché, she’s been given a younger kindred spirit as a combination apprentice and surrogate daughter: Jessie (Cailee Spaeny), a 20-ish wannabe war correspondent whose lack of worldliness is her defining characteristic. Jessie isn’t a character, but a device; her job will be to carry the torch for journalistic integrity after her mentor (inevitably) meets her demise in the line of duty.

Lest that last bit seem like a spoiler, Civil War is the sort of movie in which hard-edged professionals grimly sit around prophesying their own fates. And although Lee’s arc is predictable, the flatness of the role is no fault of Dunst’s; like Jessie Buckley in Men , the actress inhabits Garland’s barren idea of dramaturgy so fully that she occasionally draws us all the way in with her. Spaeny, meanwhile, is livelier than she was as an anesthetized princess in Priscilla , yet Jessie isn’t much more than a cipher—a device through which we witness a series of showdowns between characters of different allegiances or tableaux testifying to the sheer photogenic brokenness of the social contract. In structural terms, Civil War is a road movie, with Lee and Jessie traveling from New York to Washington in the company of two other members of the fifth estate: a hard-drinking (and, it’s implied, possibly sexually predatory) reporter, Joel (Wagner Moura), and an ex-op-ed specialist, Sammy (Stephen McKinley Henderson), both of whom have inside information on the embattled president’s location and hopes of scoring a final interview before he’s toppled once and for all.

Civil War has been set up so that each successive rest stop bristles with a different kind of anxiety. Stopping for gas means encountering a garage’s worth of bloody strung-up dissidents, displayed like trophies for rubberneckers. Despite traveling with the word “press” emblazoned on their van and flak jackets, Lee and her merry band aren’t insulated from the surrounding dangers, and on a few occasions, they even go looking for trouble: A firefight in an abandoned apartment complex eventually finds Jessie growing into her point-and-click instincts. (The juxtaposition of different kinds of “shooting” in this movie is relentless, a pale imitation of motifs developed in Full Metal Jacket , which, like all of Kubrick’s provocations, understood the relationship between savagery and satire.)

A couple of the set pieces are effective, like an idyll in a Lynchian small town whose smiling inhabitants seem oblivious to the larger conflict (the punchline is Garland’s best and shiveriest sight gag), or a pitched battle between snipers whose worldview no longer extends beyond their own scopes. But there are also risible bits, like a nighttime drive through a forest fire where the floating, burning embers are meant as signifiers of some terrible, fatalistic beauty—a scene that, however well shot, practically vibrates with banality. And then there’s the bit featuring a wandering platoon of disillusioned, trigger-happy soldiers—a device Garland used as far back as 28 Days Later —led by a deadpan Jesse Plemons, clad in red heart-shaped shades that mock the idea of seeing the world through rose-colored glasses. “What kind of Americans are you?” he asks our heroes, who, having found themselves on the wrong end of the barrel, don’t know how to answer.

The failure to communicate is ominous, but the question (and its consequences) might be even scarier if we knew what kind of America Civil War took place in. Last month at South by Southwest, Garland got in some trouble when he said that “left and right are ideological arguments about how to run a state” and that he didn’t consider either to be “good or bad.” The statement may have been twisted in bad faith by the media (another irony considering the film’s faith in journalists as truth tellers), but at a minimum, it still suggests a filmmaker who doesn’t want to get his hands dirty with such crass things as sociopolitical specifics.

It may be that trying to fill in the blanks of how the sort of scenario depicted in Civil War could come to pass is a fool’s errand—an invitation to criticism that would weaken an already rickety conceptual infrastructure. (Exhibit A: a fleeting mention of “The Antifa Massacre,” which sounds more like a band name than a possible flashpoint.) But would it really be worse than using America’s current political strife as a coy structuring absence? Would it be worse than Garland acting as if such avoidance makes him the adult in the room? The ostensibly outrageous climax, meanwhile, features sequences of urban warfare meant to drop jaws, but these scenes point in such an obvious direction that the suspense is flattened while the audience is simply flattered into acquiescence. There are a number of genuinely profound movies whose thesis boils down to “war is hell,” several less expensive or pretentious than Civil War , but typically they arrive there honestly, and only after challenging their audience. Civil War , which is somehow simultaneously pedantic and frictionless, feels weirdly like a movie of the moment that won’t last—a victory lap around an observation that was already made by Axl Rose.

Adam Nayman is a film critic, teacher, and author based in Toronto; his book The Coen Brothers: This Book Really Ties the Films Together is available now from Abrams.

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