The Media Research Center wasn’t sure how to react to the new movie “Civil War.” Christian Toto spent his April 6 column trying to make it clear the movie’s president was not based on Donald Trump and that the film’s principals have said as much:
Few films have stirred the cultural pot quite like “Civil War.”
The April 12 release envisions a near-future America at war with itself.
Kirsten Dunst leads an ensemble cast including “Parks and Recreation” standout Nick Offerman as the U.S. president. Much of the film’s story has been kept under wraps. The film’s SXSW Film and TV Festival debut let some light shine on the narrative.
Offerman’s president, for example, has fascistic tendencies and is currently serving his third term.
It must be Trump. Of course.If Hollywood has taught us anything over the past seven-plus years it’s that it can’t stop referencing the 45th president. And, almost every time said commentary is unflattering.To be kind.That’s exactly what journalists were hoping from “Civil War.” It’s why they’re trying to get the film’s stars to admit it. So far, they’re striking out.Offerman spoke to a Hollywood Reporter journalist at length about the project during the red carpet premiere. The actor, who famously played a libertarian on “Parks and Recreation,” is a liberal in real life. He still didn’t take the reporter’s bait. He shoos away any suggestion his character is Trumpian to the core.
[…]His views echoed those of writer/director Alex Garland. The “Ex-Machina” creator has repeatedly said his film is bipartisan. The big picture he wants to share? Let’s stop attacking each other before it’s too late.
An April 7 post by Jorge Bonilla, however, imposed the MRC’s hard-right anti-media narrative on the movie:
“Civil War” has played it extremely close to the ideological vest in its trailers and promotion, but CBS Sunday Morning may have let the cat out of the bag. If true, a promising film may in fact yet be another exercise in Hollywood leftist projection.
Watch as CBS Sunday Morning contributor Ben Mankiewicz gives away a major plot point: that the authoritarian president has, in this instance, abolished the Federal Bureau of Investigation[.] […]
The lack of Hollywood condemnation as trailers were released was, in hindsight, an early tell. We heard nary a peep in this instance. And now we know why.
Writer/director Alex Garland intentionally attempted to dissuade people from trying to glean ideology from the early trailers. He admits as much by writing the rebel forces as being from both Texas and California. But abolition of the FBI these days is a hard ideological lean in one direction.
Whatever post-9/11 reservations the left may have had about the FBI are long gone now, given its embrace of the deployment of those anti-terrorism tools against United States citizens in the political opposition. Federal law enforcement seems to be at the locus of every action taken against American internal dissidents, whether it be pro-life protesters such as Mark Houck, the broad campaign to suppress political speech online, or federal agents showing up at people’s homes over social media posts, among many other intrusions.
Nowadays, only one side of the political spectrum regards the FBI as the instrument of a weaponized federal government, and it isn’t the left.
Is Bonilla admitting that abolition of the FBI is a key right-wing goal/ It appears so. He also leaves out inconvenient information in the examples he cites. Mark Houck’s arrest by the FBI came after an alleged altercation with a Planned Parenthood volunteer outside an abortion clinic (he was later acquitted at trial). The “broad campaign to suppress political speech online” refers to content moderation to combat lies and misinformation. And “federal agents showing up at people’s homes over social media posts” is pretty common, if those posts involve hate or violent threats; the example he provided was of a woman who was visited after making anti-Israel posts, something we thought the MRC was in favor of.
Bonilla concluded by defending his right-wing narrative:
Reasonable people can thus be skeptical of a major motion picture, released ahead of a presidential election, that depicts a runaway authoritarian president who abolished the FBI and brought the country to civil war. The Trumpian braggadocio about military victory is just the cherry on top.
I really hope to be wrong about this, and hope that this is really an independent, thought-provoking nonpartisan film about the perils of political polarization. That is, as opposed to the “Democracy is on the ballot” equivalent of what “The Day After Tomorrow” did for the climate cult.
But Hollywood’s track record on these things indicates otherwise. For the time being? I’m not buying it.
When you’re a right-wing like Bonilla, anyone who fails to conform to his right-wing ideology is seen as an enemy.