Civil War, now streaming on Max, is a dystopian action-adventure film set in a near-future U.S. Directed by Alex Garland (Never Let Me Go, Ex Machina), the highly anticipated film is a major disappointment.

The biggest problem with the film is that it takes no point of view. It presents both sides of the conflict as equally revolting. Its absurd premise is that the war against the federal government was started by California and Texas, two diametrically opposed states. What the rebels want and why they want it is never expressed.

The film follows four journalists on a road trip from New York City to Washington, D.C. during the war. They are played by Kirsten Dunst as a big-name photographer, Wagner Moura as her interviewing partner, Stephen McKinley Henderson as a veteran newsman, and Cailee Spaeny as a naïve young photographer who hopes to follow in Dunst’s footsteps.

Moura’s reason for going is to interview the besieged U.S. president.

Along the way, the journalists are cautioned to just observe, and not interject themselves into the action whether they approve of what’s going on or not. This is made especially clear during an early scene in which their press car stops for gas and Spaeny wanders off, followed by a rebel with a rifle. Spaeny, now joined by Dunst, opens a barn door and discovers two men hanging from the rafters. The guy with the rifle tells them that he has been beating them for two days and can either shoot them now or beat them some more and let them go. Dunst’s response is that Spaeny should take a picture of the guy standing between the two hanging men. He agrees, and Spaeny takes the picture before moving on.

The next major scene involves Moura’s friend and rival interviewer (Nelson Lee) and his driver (Evan Lai) catching up to them on the road. Daredevil Lee jumps between moving cars to land in the backseat of the car Dunst is then driving, and Spaeny does the same thing in reverse. Unable to locate the car with Spaeny and Lai in it, Moura, Dunst, Henderson, and Lee eventually find them about to be shot and buried in a mass grave with other bodies dumped by government troops.

The soldier holding the rifle on Spaeny and Lai is played by Jesse Plemons who steals the film in his sole scene in it.

The film ends in the White House with Nick Offerman in a lame portrayal of the U.S. president.

This film comes nowhere near the greatness of Garland’s earlier work, but it does contain outstanding cinematography by Rob Hardy (Testament of Youth, Ex Machina) and editing by Jake Roberts (Brooklyn, Hell and High Water).

Nine years ago, I was not impressed with Inside Out, the extravagantly praised Oscar-winning Pixar film with its unique approach of having a young girl’s emotions played by cartoon characters drive her actions. I thought the concept was great, but the execution of it was mostly silly. Why I would expect its 2024 sequel, Inside Out 2, to be any better, I have no idea, but I decided to give it a try on Blu-ray. The result was another disappointment. I kept thinking that if I wanted to watch a movie about a 13-year-old girl’s summer camp experiences and its aftermath, I would be better off watching the original 1961 version of The Parent Trap. I’m sorry I didn’t.

My best home viewing experience this week was the Warner Archive Blu-ray of 1950’s Three Little Words.

An unassuming film of the lesser-known songwriting team of Bert Kalmar and Harry Ruby, the film was a sleeper hit for MGM following the honorary Oscar given Fred Astaire at the 1949 Oscars early in 1950. Astaire, who won a Golden Globe playing Kalmar, often referred to the film as one of his favorites. Red Skelton, who played Ruby, gave one of his best performances eschewing his usual mugging.

Vera-Ellen as Astaire’s dancer wife, and Arlene Dahl as Skelton’s singing wife provided charming support. Adding to the fun, Gloria De Haven sang “Who’s Sorry Now” playing her own mother, Mrs. Carter De Haven who introduced the song. An unbilled Debbie Reynolds and Carlton Carpenter all but stole the film playing boop-boop-deboop girl Helen Kane and her husband, dancer Dan Healy performing Kane’s signature song, “I Wanna Be Loved by You” with Kane dubbing Reynolds’ vocals.

Extras include the featurette Three Little Words: Two Swell Guys featuring composer Richard M. Sherman, Dahl, Carpenter, and De Haven imported from the 2006 DVD.

Also newly released on Blu-ray by Warner Archive is 1948’s Words and Music, the heavily fictionized biography of Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart.

Although the film’s guest stars June Allyson, Perry Como, Judy Garland, Lena Horne, Gene Kelly, and Ann Sothern share top billing with Mickey Rooney who plays Hart, the film is primarily acted, in addition to Rooney, by Tom Drake as Rodgers, Janet Leigh as Rodgers’ wife, and Betty Garrett as a fictional love interest for Rooney’s Hart.

The film looks better than it did on the 2007 DVD, but still seems somewhat faded especially compared to the spectacular look of Three Little Words made just two years later.

While it wasn’t likely that the filmmakers would acknowledge Hart’s homosexuality in 1948, there was no excuse for the film making it appear as though Rodgers and Hart were together through the 1944 revival of A Connecticut Yankee when in reality Rodgers had already moved on to working with Oscar Hammerstein II with whom he wrote the score for 1943’s Oklahoma!

Still, the film is worth seeing for the musical performances, especially the dancing of Gene Kelly and Vera-Ellen to “Slaughter on Tenth Avenue” and the singing of Betty Garrett on “There’s a Small Hotel” and “Way Out West,” Perry Como and Allyn Ann McLerie on “Mountain Greenery,” June Allyson on “Thou Swell,” Tom Drake (dubbed by Bill Lee) on “With a Song in My Heart,” Lena Horne on “Where or When” and “The Lady Is a Tramp,” Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney on “I Wish I Were in Love Again,” Mel Tormé on “Blue Moon,” and more.

Happy viewing.