Kirsten Dunst Struggled with ‘PTSD’ After ‘Civil War’ Production: The Violence ‘Shook Me to My Core’

After “The Power of the Dog,” Kirsten Dunst feels typecast; fortunately, she is no “sad mom” in Alex Garland’s A24 film “Civil War.”

Dunst plays a photojournalist documenting a post-apocalyptic American secession in the upcoming movie. How real is its combat scenes? Well, Dunst said in a Marie Claire cover story that she “had PTSD for a good two weeks after” production wrapped.

More from IndieWire

• Sex and Car Crashes Collide in AI Short from a Filmmaker Who Feared AI

• 'Problemista' Channeled 'Aladdin' to Build Craigslist a Trash Cave of Wonders

“I remember coming home and eating lunch and I felt really empty,” Dunst said, adding that the combat scenes “shook me to my core.”

“I remember hearing them practice an explosion,” she continued. “We were in the hair and makeup trailer, which was very far away from set, and the whole trailer shook. There’s so much gunfire, and then you look at the news and it’s a school shooting again.”

The “Marie Antoinette” actress described “Civil War” as a “cautionary tale, a fable of what happens when people don’t communicate with each other and stop seeing each other as human beings.”

The feature film was Dunst’s first movie in two years following her Oscar-nominated turn in Jane Campion’s “The Power of the Dog.”

“I haven’t worked in two years,” Dunst said. “Every role I was being offered was the sad mom. To be honest, that’s been hard for me…because I need to feed myself. The hardest thing is being a mom and…not feeling like, I have nothing for myself. That’s every mother — not just me. There’s definitely less good roles for women my age. That’s why I did ‘Civil War.'”

Dunst added of Garland’s upcoming film: “When I read the script, I thought, ‘I’ve never done anything like this.'”

It is certainly not “Spider-Man.”

“Priscilla” breakout Cailee Spaeny, Wagner Moura, Sonoya Mizuno, Stephen McKinley Henderson, and Nick Offerman co-star in “Civil War,” which opens in theaters on April 12.

Best of IndieWire

• The Best LGBTQ Movies and TV Shows Streaming on Netflix Right Now

• Guillermo del Toro's Favorite Movies: 54 Films the Director Wants You to See

• Nicolas Winding Refn's Favorite Films: 37 Movies the Director Wants You to See

Sign up for Indiewire's Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.