Avengers split in revitalizing Civil War – Hollywood film to revisit Chappaquiddick events

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And yet in the ashes of “Avengers: Age of Ultron” the brain trust behind Marvel Studios and directors Joe and Anthony Russo have built what is easily one of the strongest films of their so-called cinematic universe with “Captain America: Civil War” an engaging, lively and just flat out fun use of the characters we’ve gotten to know across the last eight years and 12 films.

As our interest waned in the prospect of yet another supervillain threatening to destroy an entire city or planet, Marvel smartly pivoted and turned the conflict inward. With the near inevitability of a civilian death toll any time the Avengers are involved in an incident, the UN steps in with an accord proposing regulation and oversight. Essentially now, the Avengers need permission before they jump into action.

Tony Stark/Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr) is for it. Steve Rogers/Captain America (Chris Evans) is against it. And the rest of the Avengers must decide where they side, leading to some interesting alliances — like Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) going against her pal Cap, Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) positioning against his friend Black Widow, and so on.

Chance

Some of it is rather silly, especially the villain Zemo, whose somewhat nonsense plan leaves a lot to chance and coincidence. Daniel Bru¸hl, as always, is great in the role, but still little more than a plot device — as though the screenwriters thought that it would be too dark for the good guys to fracture without a push from a manipulative outsider.

The good news is that this Avengers movie in disguise keeps everything rather intimate for a superhero movie. There are only so many times these films can get away with scenes of massive destruction — the thrill (and horror) of the spectacle starts to dull. In “Civil War” the combat is mostly hand-to-hand, the stakes are personal, and the set pieces small. The showdown of the superhero teams is confined to an airport runway, for instance.

That airport sequence, by the way, is exceptionally entertaining. It’s both witty and visually engaging and worth the price of admission. Cap, Falcon (Anthony Mackie), Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen), Hawkeye, Ant-Man (Paul Rudd) and the Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan) face off against Iron Man, Black Widow, War Machine (Don Cheadle), Vision (Paul Bettany) and the two newbies, Spider-Man (Tom Holland) and Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman).

It’s also hard not to be a little cynical about the obvious corporate machinations of “Civil War,” like the introduction of Spider-Man and Black Panther — two characters who we already know are getting their own movies. Every moment with them feels like a trailer, and like the best trailers, we see only the finest stuff. “Civil War” dares you to not be won over by Holland’s youthful comedic charm and Boseman’s depth as the stoic prince in the killer suit.

We also can conjecture, for instance, that Spider-Man doesn’t ultimately have much of an impact on the plot because the actual Spider-Man movie will eventually come from Sony, not Disney. Does any of this really matter if the movies are good? No, of course not. We just know too much about the roadmap to make any of it seem spontaneous, surprising and organic. Characters can’t just break out from the pack on their own merits. If they could, Marvel probably would have resurrected the idea for a Black Widow movie by now.

The thing is, Marvel makes it funny, and that charm and care is what has and will keep audiences coming back over and over again.

“Captain America: Civil War,” a Walt Disney Studios release, is rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association of America for “extended sequences of violence, action and mayhem.” Running time: 147 minutes. Three stars out of four.

During a week in which the eyes of the nation were focused on NASA’s first moon landing, a tragic drama played out on a tiny Massachusetts island that would have political ramifications for decades to follow.

The late Democratic Sen Edward Kennedy’s actions, explanations and motives in the hours and days after a car he was driving slipped off Chappaquiddick’s Dike Bridge on July 18, 1969, killing Mary Jo Kopechne, have been explored in numerous articles, books and documentaries. Now, the groundwork is being laid for an independent feature film that will perhaps rekindle questions lingering for nearly a half-century.

Australian-born “Zero Dark Thirty” star Jason Clarke will portray Kennedy in “Chappaquiddick” — the film’s working title — and John Curran, whose credits include “The Painted Veil,” will direct, said the movie’s co-producer and Apex Entertainment president and chief executive Mark Ciardi. Production is slated to begin around Labor Day with a tentative release in late 2017.

“In some parts it will be educational, that, wow, in 1969 this happened, with the moon landing in the backdrop, this event happened and how everything kind of played out after that,” said Ciardi, noting that younger generations may know little about the story.

Concentrating on the immediate aftermath of the accident, the film will contain elements of political and legal intrigue, but Ciardi adds: “I certainly wouldn’t characterize it as just a political movie at all.”

Kennedy went to Martha’s Vineyard to race in the Edgartown Regatta and that evening attended a party at a rented house on serene and picturesque Chappaquiddick, which is separated from the Vineyard by a narrow strait and accessed by a small, barge-like ferry. Guests included Kennedy friends and several women, including Kopechne, who had worked on the presidential campaign of his brother Robert F. Kennedy, assassinated a year earlier.

Kennedy and Kopechne, 28, left the party together and a short time later the car plunged into Poucha Pond. Kennedy escaped from the submerged vehicle and said he made several futile attempts to rescue Kopechne, who was trapped inside.

Kennedy, who later described his failure to report the incident to police for nine hours as “indefensible,” pleaded guilty to leaving the scene of an accident and was given a two-month suspended sentence. A grand jury was convened but no indictments were returned.

Chappaquiddick would cast a long shadow over Kennedy’s storied US Senate career and likely helped thwart hopes of winning the presidency.

In his memoir, “True Compass” published shortly after his death from brain cancer in 2009, Kennedy acknowledged that many people remained skeptical and others “contemptuous” of his explanations surrounding the accident.

“I’ve had to live with that guilt for forty years,” Kennedy wrote. “But my burden is nothing compared to her (Kopechne) loss and the suffering her family had to endure.” (AP)

By Lindsey Bahr

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