This is topic Captain America: Civil War in forum Film Handlers' Movie Reviews at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.


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Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 05-06-2016, 09:29 PM:
 
Well this one should really have been titled "Avengers: Civil War, featuring Captain America" because not only does Iron Man seem to have just as big a role as the Captin does, a whole shitload of B-listers from the Marvel Universe put in cameos too, so it really seems more like an Avengers movie than a Captain America one.

At its core, this movie is built on pretty much the exact same concept as "Batman V. Superman," which is that the world is pissed about all the death and destruction caused by superhero battles. In this one, however, instead of an arch-villain constructing a reason for the two major heroes to fight each other, the governments of the world threaten to regulate the super ones, and which leads to Iron Man and Captain America getting into a fight over whether or not to comply. (Why didn't they just threaten to move to Canada?)

Then on top of that basic premise, they slather on about 30 or 40 other stories involving people from other movies, people we haven't seen yet, bad guys who were hinted at in the first or second Captain America movie, etc etc etc. And then you throw in various friends, relatives, co-workers, employees, etc. of the central 10 characters (or 20 if you include their alter-egos) and oh yeah, a few bad guys, and you are in for a brain-numbing time trying to keep up with it all.

If you're not a real "student" of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, especially the most recent Avengers, Captain America and Iron Man movies, you'll probably either be lost before the end of the first reel (like I was) or you'll have more questions than answers when the movie finally concludes with the usual "with great power comes great responsibility"-style voiceover.

All that said, this is a fun flick to watch. You can be dazzled by the action scenes, which are many and impressive, and you can chuckle at the funny parts (not as many as I hoped for) or you can plan your next vacation based on all the locations our heroes visit -- I lost count of how many continents this movie was shot on, but it was a lot.

The movie never drags, despite all the myriad plot threads. Kudos to the directors for keeping everything in order, well as much as could be expected anyway.

And it contains what I think is the best Stan Lee cameo ever -- I actually belly-laughed on that one.

The ending scene after the credits is kind of a puzzler. I don't understand why it says
Spoiler Alert - Click to Toggle
I thought the sound mix was pretty good, and the action scenes didn't seem as over-blown as in some superhero movies. I don't know if that's because they really WEREN'T that overblown or if I'm just getting used to this stuff. With the number of these films slated for release in the next few years, I guess getting used to it would be advisable.

Two out of four stars from me. Critics and our audiences have spoken otherwise... everybody coming out seems to love the movie.
 
Posted by Joseph L. Kleiman (Member # 3097) on 05-07-2016, 01:23 PM:
 
SONY is currently starting a four-film second reboot of Spider-man (1 film per each year of high school) under a new license with Disney/Marvel, the first one titled Spider-man: Homecoming, releasing June 2017. Under the new license, Disney also has rights to use the Peter Parker/Spider-man character and the actor who portrays them, Tom Holland, in its own MCU films from Marvel Studios.
 
Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 05-07-2016, 02:40 PM:
 
so wait, Disney is releasing the Spiderman movies... or Sony? I don't want Disney mucking around what Sony is already doing and showing support to UHD / Dolby Atmos on their eventual home video releases (Disney truly sucks in this department and aspect.
 
Posted by Matt Russell (Member # 8989) on 05-07-2016, 05:04 PM:
 
quote: Jonathan Goeldner
so wait, Disney is releasing the Spiderman movies... or Sony?
Sony is still financing and distributing the solo Spider Man movies, Disney just has shared creative control and rights to use the character and likeness in their movies.

I enjoyed Captain America: Civil War a lot. Not my favorite in the Marvel universe, but it's still a fun movie with a good story and characters. Surprisingly, for a movie with so many characters in it, I felt that almost all of the characters got a pretty large amount of screen time. I'm also glad they didn't just toss Black Panther and Spider Man to the side, as they were definitely high points and got good character development. There were some slow points in the film, but nothing dragged on to the point of boredom, which was a problem I had with Batman v Superman. I also thought that towards the end, there was a bit of a problem with bringing the film to a close, but it wasn't that huge of an issue. Most of the action sequences looked like they were shot in fast motion, which I don't mind, but I can see someone getting a bit of a headache if you're watching the movie in 3D. The only other thing that bugged me was the text font, which was definitely too big and a bit hard to read at times, again especially in 3D. The character interactions were pretty good, and Evans and Downey Jr. share great chemistry. While I thought it wasn't the best effort in the franchise, Captain America: Civil War still managed to be entertaining and showed how this Marvel universe has many good directions it can take going forwards.
Film: 3 out of 4 stars
Presentation: 4 out of 4 stars (saw it in IMAX, the big showdown scene shot with the Alexa camera looked really stunning on screen and the sound mix was pretty good).
 
Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 05-07-2016, 11:04 PM:
 
quote: Matt Russell
Most of the action sequences looked like they were shot in fast motion
I noticed that as well and forgot to mention it. It made them look strange to me. Not all of those scenes were shot that way, I don't think -- like the big fight at the end seemed to be at "regular" speed.
 
Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 05-20-2016, 02:44 PM:
 
I enjoyed this, it didn't fall into too many of the eye-rolling Marvel movie cliches

on a technical note: what Dolby did to tweak the image for 'Dolby Cinema' was quite remarkable. In laser: the colors, the sharpness really had a pop to it.

the Atmos mix though... eesh... Marvel's sound mixes tend to be hit or miss, this one fell in the middle. Okay, but not great.
 
Posted by Manny Knowles (Member # 1171) on 05-23-2016, 12:10 PM:
 
To quote the Emperor from "Amadeus"...

"Too many notes."

Too many unnecessary characters -- including a ga-jillion extra super heroes, and one entirely unnecessary villain.

Fight scenes go on and on endlessly -- as does the movie -- because there are so many super heroes needing screen time.

But, then, I do realize that this movie wasn't made for me. It was made to satisfy the masturbatory needs of comic book junkies.

Extremely indulgent and inefficient storytelling.
 
Posted by Sam Graham (Member # 2889) on 05-26-2016, 05:29 PM:
 
CINEMA: Warren East, Wichita, KS
AUDITORIUM: Grand (14)
PRESENTATION: Dolby Digital Cinema/THX
PRESENTATION PROBLEMS: None [Cool]
RATING: Three stars (out of four)

THE PLOT: Fucking Bucky. Wackiness ensues.

It may be Avengers Lite, but it flows better than Age of Ultron. Part of that may be that I still have a hangover from the mess that was Batman v Superman.

Sorry or the delay in posting. Been in the hospital.
 
Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 05-30-2016, 03:06 PM:
 
wow! the IMAX-laser version decimated the Dolby Cinema version - none of that faux D-box nonsense with the seats, the IMAX shot 'airport' scene, the 12-channel mix that was much more aggressive than the Dolby Atmos mix ... I was thoroughly impressed
 




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