Fans can vigorously debate whether or not it's a good idea for good guys to be fighting each other instead of villains in movies like Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice or Captain America: Civil War, but the movies exist to answer entirely separate questions: "Who would win?" and "What does it look like when they fight?" Civil War in particular has built many of its trailers and TV spots around what looks to be a single gigantic fight sequence between the rival factions of divided Avengers and their respective associates that promises to be the biggest fight between powered/enhanced characters in the Marvel Cinematic Universe thus far.
Now we know that the fight is going to be a big one on two different levels: Extra long in screen time and extra big in format.
Revealed by directors Anthony and Joe Russo during ScreenRant's recent set visit interviews on the film, the film's action centerpiece is set to run an eyebrow-raising 15 minutes in length. That's a lot of screentime to devote to a single battle, but it's worth keeping in mind that said battle is set to feature at least a dozen main characters - a few of whom have the ability to unleash destruction equivalent to that of a small army on their own. But that's not all: The writer/director's also revealed that the entire sequence has been filmed as a showcase for the IMAX/ARRI 2D digital camera - a new state-of-the-art high definition device representing a a joint customized digital version of ARRI’s new large format Alexa 65.
Said co-director Joe Russo on working in IMAX:
"This whole sequence is in IMAX, it's about a 15-minute sequence. It's the only one that we're doing on the camera. The camera literally just rolled off the press like a week before we started using it. It's an IMAX 65, so it's the ARRI's 65. It's a join camera between ARRI's and IMAX. We're going to shoot all of Infinity War on those cameras."
The premium aspect-ratio, exclusive to official IMAX productions, will help to increase the sense of depth and immersion necessary to place audiences in the middle of what is certain to be a chaotic moment in the story, which finds past and present members of The Avengers bitterly divided over a new government initiative to regulate the activities of superheroes - splitting the onetime allies into rival factions led by freedom-favoring Captain America and a newly government-compliant Iron Man.
As these characters now have several years and multiple films worth of friendship between them, things will likely have arrived in a particularly grim place for them to actually come to full-on blows in this moment; which will also mark the first official team-up between Paul Rudd's Ant-Man and members of The Avengers and the Marvel Cinematic Universe debut of The Black Panther. War Machine, Vision, Scarlet Witch, Hawkeye, Sharon Carter and The Winter Soldier are also known to appear in the sequence; though given Marvel's track record one can likely expect a few surprises to come up as well - after all, we still don't know whose side Spider-Man is on...
Captain America: Civil War will release on May 6, 2016, followed by Doctor Strange – November 4, 2016; Guardians of the Galaxy 2 – May 5, 2017; Spider-Man – July 7, 2017; Thor: Ragnarok – November 3, 2017; Black Panther – February 16, 2018; The Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 – May 4, 2018; Ant-Man and the Wasp– July 6, 2018; Captain Marvel – March 8, 2019; The Avengers: Infinity War Part 2 – May 3, 2019; Inhumans– July 12, 2019; and as-yet untitled Marvel movies on May 1, July 10 and November 6, 2020.