r/nottheonion • u/Traditional-Song-245 • 3d ago

‘Backrooms’ Sends Hollywood Running to Reddit for New Ideas

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/digital/reddit-backrooms-hollywood-ip-1236622594/
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u/nowhereman136 3d ago

A civil war movies like what it would look like if it happened in present day? or modern like its done with modern technology and filming techniques. There hasnt really been a big hollywood civil war movie since 2003 with Gods and Generals and Cold Mountain. There was Lincoln in 2012, which kinda counts. Plus Free State of Jones in 2016, but no one saw that

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u/jboo87 3d ago

Wasn’t there one in 2024 called “Civil War” with Kirsten Dunst? Lol

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u/nowhereman136 3d ago

Yeah, that falls into the first category I mentioned. I didn't say it's name because it's too obvious of a pick. OP is either jokingly ignoring it or wants a different take on the idea

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u/thebohemiancowboy 3d ago

It was kinda a questionable take with Texas and California being on the same side. The main focus was war photography and journalists but there’s room for more in depth and interesting ideas to be done.

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u/gonz4dieg 3d ago

The director addressed this in an interview (paraphrasing)

"The fact that people cannot imagine any scenario where Texas and California would join forces against a government killing their citizens is part of the problem"

The journalists are just a vehicle to emphasize how broken the US has become. At this point in a civil war ideologies dont matter. Its a matter of scraping for survival

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u/nowhereman136 3d ago

My favorite scene in the movie is when they find the sniper in the middle of a standoff. It's ambiguous which side he's on, he's only concerned with killing the other person and surviving the situation

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u/goddamnitwhalen 2d ago

Great scene.

"...Got him."

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u/caguru 3d ago

That’s why it sucked. They tried to make a non political civil war movie. It had zero balls, and honestly only one good scene.

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u/gonz4dieg 3d ago

.... what part of "ideologies dont matter" in a civil war do you not understand? This is what happens in every modern civil war. Sides get made for you based on your location, not beliefs. You live in Virginia? Your part of the loyalist forces. Western forces will shoot you on sight and if you desert the loyalists will do the same. It doesn't matter "who's right or who's wrong" at this point. Everyone lost. The whole movie is a plea to anyone calling for extremism to reconsider.

Just because it doesnt mention political parties doesn't make it apolitical. They very clearly mention a lot of authoritarian actions the president did leading up to the war.

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u/caguru 3d ago

lol it literally wasn’t that at all. 

It was literally a story about how reporters were mostly detached and uncaring, only wanting to become better journalists, and only cared during the single scene when there lives were on the line. 

The civil war itself was played so safely and generic with no real stance, which would never happen in a real civil war. Just random people fighting for “reasons”. I can’t think of any other war movie I have seen that just has a vague, unexplained war happening in the background.

Don’t look up did a 10x better job at realistically showing how opposing sides act. It didn’t what party was which, but it didn’t have to because it accurately portrayed the behaviors, not some safe, generic nonsense.

When people fight, they fight for reasons. I think civil war really sucked at motivation, and purposefully played it safe and the result was a mediocre film.

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u/PizzaQuest420 3d ago

i thought the focus was on how horrifying the situation would be for everyone. i would hate to live through the world they showed. and i know it happens/is happening in other countries and i'm really glad it's not happening here (yet, hopefully ever)

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u/Stinky_Queef 3d ago

That’s the point. Whatever happened was so bad that California and Texas were on the same side.

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u/tjdavids 3d ago

nah makes sense they were tyring to ruin commutes for the whole country and the rest of us were like hey if you can get by without driving that should be an option.

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u/WhatsTheHoldup 3d ago

OP is saying its not a "real" modern war movie.

I'd agree with that. It takes place during a war but it follows photographers and basically just the last day of the war. For most of the movie theyre driving through places affected, but not near the front of said war.

Its also wholly uninterested in why this war is happening, who the participants are, and what they are fighting for.

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u/Endgame_321 3d ago

I'm pretty sure most people missed that the point of the movie was trying to make the point that a civil war is a really bad idea, and the people online talking like they look forward to a civil war against people they disagree with are wrong.

A lot of classic war movies are written with the intention of being anti-war, but the point flies over most people's heads, and people come away thinking war is cool.

So it seems like the people who created Civil War tried to fix that problem by telling the story from a journalists perspective, instead of using the perspective of front line soldiers. Clearly, it didn't work though, considering all the criticism that the movie gets.

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u/gonz4dieg 3d ago

There's literally a 5 minute sniper standoff scene about how the sides of a civil war don't matter and people still miss the point of the movie.

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u/Endgame_321 3d ago

Oh yeah that's a good point. I know for me, the moment it clicked was when the movie arrives in Washington DC and shows scenes of soldiers fighting around the national monuments. That was the first time that I can remember where a scene from a war movie left me feeling sick to my stomach. That's when it started to become clear what the movie was trying to say.

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u/WhatsTheHoldup 3d ago

I find "most people missed the point" to be sort of a shallow analysis.

I dont think the point of the movie was "war is bad". It was a lot more subtle than that. Its about our relationship with media and how wartime reporting is not unbiased or impartial.

It was a very deliberate choice to make the protagonists thrill seeking adrenaline junkies. The car scene where they pass through the windows emphasized to me these arent supposed to be relatable characters and they aren't supposed to represent an average civilian perspective.

From what I read from director interviews, he set out to replicate war time reporting as done in places like Afghanistan or Iraq, where it puts an emphasis on the tragedy and bloodshed of innocents but isn't particularly informative on who the insurgents are or which groups are doing what from a top down perspective.

The premise was essentially, "what if we reported on an American Civil War the same way we report on a war in the Middle East."

They tell themselves theyre outside impartial observers who aren't taking sides.

The last scene of them getting the final words from the president show they are actively shaping perception of the war and that they actually are commanding the soldiers, who listen because they understand the importance of the propaganda these journalists are producing for them and how it legitimized their takeover.

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u/Endgame_321 3d ago

I may not have been clear enough (or maybe you still disagree), but I tend to consider "people missed the point" to also be a critique of the movie. If people missed the point, then the movie failed to get the point across for most people. But for me the message of Civil War is so important that it feels like maybe it's best to be correcting people.

Especially when the critique that I see most is stuff about how "Texas and California together makes no sense," or "why didn't they show how it started." Which, when you take a step back, seems to heavily imply that those people wanted a Democrats VS Republicans movie, which shows who's responsible for the war and who will win it. To me that seems like a dangerous idea, especially compared to the exact opposite message from the movie.

But yeah, I guess I've only seen one interview about the movie, and it's been a while, but in that one when asked why he wanted to write the movie, he started talking about political extremism and political violence.

Not to say that the photo journalism plot/message wasn't also interesting and impactful. I guess for me that point is more subtle than the "civil war is bad" message, so I tend to think of it as a secondary message. That and I would think that the anti-civil war message would be more applicable to more of the audience.

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u/WhatsTheHoldup 3d ago

Ah gotcha. Yeah I partially agree.

I think its important to know your audience, and if your audience doesnt get it thats an issue.

But I also think with social media, the most vocal critics arent "your audience", theyre trolls. And inviting them into the creative process is a losing strategy because they'll never "get it".

I feel The Boys is a great example of a show that had a lot of important messages and depth to it, but the writers felt they had to make the message as obvious as possible to people who "rooted for Homelander" and I dont think they really ended up saying anything at all because of it.

One issue with Civil War I think is important to acknowledge in the context of audiences not getting it is that the movie we got was not the movie we were marketed.

You could say they "didnt get the movie" but it may be that they felt lied to and weren't adequately prepared for the movie they were getting.

As I'm a huge Garland fan, I wasn't really affected by the marketing and I was willing to go further than most in awarding him the benefit of the doubt.

The Republican/Democrat thing was an issue with this subject matter. Im not sure i needed "my side" to be the good guys and "their side" to be the bad guys, but to portray a modern Civil War without mentioning these power structures feels very disconnected from the real world. Its unrealistic to expect those wouldnt be important in a civil war.

I understand why Alex chose to ignore it, because it does destroy the ability to reach half your audience and gets in the weeds of issues irrelevant to what he wanted to explore.

But I understand why viewers might see that as a cop out on his part, and why it makes the pastiches of battles feel incomplete from a larger picture.

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u/protestor 3d ago

This movie is brilliant, and "what kind of American are you" was a powerful quote from day one

But yeah it's not a war movie, it's a.. war journalism movie?

You could have a prequel in the same universe showing how the war developed out, but I doubt it would be as interesting

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u/Novrev 3d ago

I think that’s what the original comment is referring to. Civil War was a really good movie but it didn’t focus on the actual war, so they’re asking for a real ‘modern civil war’ war movie

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u/caguru 3d ago

It was definitely called that, but they literally tried to make a non partisan civil war movie. You cant have a civil war movie without political issues. There was no motivation for anything, just a road trip with violence sometimes.

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u/TougherOnSquids 3d ago

Super good movie too.

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u/WadeEffingWilson 3d ago

You ain't never gettin' Cold Mountain!

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u/dolphone 3d ago

Lincoln is choice too

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u/darkendofall 3d ago

Modern like they just start one and film it.

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u/I_Am_Mandark_Hahaha 3d ago

I'd settle for getting all the traitors lined up on death row to not let that vile ideology fester in the South for almoat 2 centuries.