I went into
Guardians with high expectations. They had started growing from moment one. The announcement that a fairly obscure Marvel title was going to be made into a massive movie impressed me. This was a bit of a gamble on the part of Marvel and showed that company was willing to take some risks in their cash cow, the Cinematic Universe. Once the 2013 Comic-Con teaser was leaked I as even more excited. It looked amazing. I've liked most of writer/director James Gunn's work, so his being attached to the project I took as good news. As more trailers and images were released, I was impressed by the look of the film universe and with the snippets of acting I saw. Finally, the soundtrack was the icing on a very tasty looking cake. It was a great mix of songs and the word that they would be integrated into the on-screen action intrigued me.
Did the film live up to these expectations?
Mostly.
Synopsis
Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) is kidnapped from Earth as a child on the night his mother dies. 26 years later, he is an interstellar thief who calls himself Star-Lord. While stealing a mysterious and valuable orb, he encounters Korath (Djimon Hounsou) a follower of Ronan the Accuser (Lee Pace). Ronan is a renegade Kree warrior who wants to destroy the planet Xandar with the aid of Thanos (Josh Brolin), who was briefly seen in
The Avengers. Quill is also being chased by his former employer, space pirate Yondu (Michael rooker) the man who kidnapped Peter. He also wants the sphere to sell it. We are rapidly introduced to the rest of our protagonists: bounty hunters Rocket Raccoon (a humanoid raccoon voiced by Bradley Cooper) and Groot (a sentient plant voiced by Vin Diesel), Thanos's adopted daughter and Ronan's henchwoman Gamora (Zoe Saldana) who wants to stop him from destroying Xandar, and angry killing machine Drax the Destroyer (Dave Bautista) who wants vengeance for his family, who were by murdered Ronan.
Our protagonists are captured by Xandar's military/police force, the Nova Corps and sent to the Kyln, a massive space prison (it is here they meet Drax). They decide that Ronan has to be stopped, that they cannot sit back and let him murder billions of people. They also learn that the orb contains an Infinity Stone, an object of immense power that Thanos - who is helping Ronan destroy Xandar - wants. Ronan eventually get his hands on the stone, tells Thanos he no longer needs his help and heads to Xandar. The team convinces Yondu to join them in stopping Ronan. The final confrontation takes in the skies over Xandar. In the end, our heroes defeat Ronan (vaporizing him) and head off into space to keep the galaxy safe. Well, safe-ish. The end.
Analysis
When I started to watch the movie, I was taking notes. After about thirty minutes, I stopped. I was enjoying the film enough that I didn't want to get distracted. Also, I realized that it wasn't really that complex of a film to warrant a detailed analysis. That's not to say it's bad; it's not. It is a great movie. But, it is not a deep movie.
The plot is pretty perfunctory. It is basically a MacGuffin chase. While the inclusion of Infinity Stones into other marvel films (the Tesseract in
Thor, the Aether in
Thor: The Dark World) is leading up to a version of the Infinity Gauntlet story (see
here for details of the comicbook story) most likely in
Avengers 3, it's just an excuse to propel the story forward. The movie actually acknowledges this when
Rocket interrupts potential buyer The Collector (Benicio del Toro) while he is telling the Guardians about the background of the orb, saying they "aren't there for a history lesson." It is clear that the orb
in this film is secondary to what Gunn really cares about, character moments, witty dialogue and rousing action scenes.
The focus on characters is limited to the Guardians. The main villain, Ronan, is a by-the-numbers genocidal maniac. He has no depth and it is unclear why anyone would even follow him. His sidekick Nebula (Karen Gillan), who is another adopted daughter of Thanos, gets a little more useful screentime. She's basically motivated by step-daddy-issues and sibling rivalry; but, that's better than generic genocidal maniac and, since she survives the movie, we may see more of her in the future.
Each of the Guardians gets enough screentime that they have some depth. The focus is on Quill, but not to the exclusion of the others. While the some of the motivations are fiction 101 (e.g., Drax's family was killed by Ronan) they work. The writing for each character rapidly and expertly develops distinct and engaging personalities. By the end of the movie, I didn't care much about Ronan or Xandar being blown up; but, I did want to spend a lot more time with our heroes. Not only are they written well, but each of the actors does a superb job. Pratt has great screen presence, wonderful comedic timing and seems to embody reluctant hero perfectly. Cooper's voice work with Rocket is another stand out. Heck, Vin Vin diesel, who says a grand total of five words in the entire film, does good voice work, conveying varying emotions while saying "I Am Groot" (yeah, I know that's three words. I'll leave four and five as a surprise). Saldana and Bautista also deliver solid performances.
The action scenes are well done with clear fight choreography and stunning CG. This is some of the most consistently great CG I've ever seen. Groot and Rocket are amazing creations, particularly the latter. And, the colors POP. This is a bright, almost four-color super-hero film. Even scenes in otherwise dreary places - like the prison - have a lot of color worked in and are vibrantly shot. The look is key to establishing a setting that has a fun, adventurous tone.
It is the tone of the movie that really makes everything work, that makes the whole much more than the sum of the parts. Other movies have had big space battles and over the top action scenes. They've had snarky characters who spout one-liners while mowing down hordes of generic bad guys. They've had anti-heroes who come through in the end, just like we knew they would. If you break
Guardians down to it's basic components, you get those things again. However, Gunn and co-writer Nicole Perlman have created a perfect balance between action, drama and humor. I mean that; it is tonally perfect. The movie is funny, without being a comedy. Think about the humor in the original
Star Wars or
Raiders of the Lost Ark. Both we fairly serious action-adventures but both had a sly sense of humor that fit the characters. There is a scene in
Raiders that encapsulates this style of humor perfectly. Indiana Jones is confronted by a bad guy with an immense sword. Everyone knows how that ends; instead of long drawn out fight, Indy casually pulls out his gun and shoots the villain dead. It has a serious tone - our hero just gunned down a guy. It subverts genre expectations; we assume they'll be another long fight, because that's what always happens. And, it is funny, particularly the look on Indy's face; you know he's thinking "I really don't have time for this." It's the same here. Whether it is Quill being snarky or Drax humorously not understanding a metaphor, the characters deliver the numerous funny moments naturally, in a way that doesn't detract or distract form the more dramatic elements. Those elements are present. The movie looks at themes of being an outsider, constructing a family from friends, and the self-destructive nature of revenge. It has true moments of pathos that work because of how quickly you care about the protagonists. This is an action movie and the action sequences are what propels the film. However, Gunn includes just enough quiet character moments to give the audience a breather and let the characters establish themselves as unique individuals, not just one-dimensional collections of cliches and tropes.
It is this balance that makes Guardians such a great film. Too many big budget genre films try to overwhelm the viewer with special effects (e.g., the Transformers films) to hide the fact that their stories are terrible and their characters flat. Guardians is one effects sequence after another. It could have fallen into this trap, just trying to swamp the audience with images and hope they don't realize how hollow the whole package is (e.g., Avatar). but, Guardians has been constructed so carefully and the main characters are interesting enough that this doesn't happen. Beyond the spectacle are character stories that matter.
The film does have flaws. As mentioned, the plot isn't very original (it seems to follow a pretty standard MCU formula) and the main villain is bland. Saldana and Pratt don't much scene chemistry and their attraction to each other feels kind of perfunctory. Now, a relationship between Gamora and Groot...that would be hot. Just watch out for splinters. There are a number of minor characters - like John C Reilly as Nova Corps member Rhomann Dey - who have just enough screen time to make them seem like they might be interesting, but not enough to avoid feeling underwritten. And, there a couple of scenes that, while moving the story forward, make little sense as far as character motivation goes. One in particular, where The Collector's assistant Carina (Ophelia Lovibond) grabs the exposed Infinity Stone, causing her death and a massive explosion, seems to only serve the purpose of showing how powerful the Stones are and how dangerous they are for anyone to handle. Is she trying to kill The Collector? Is she trying to commit suicide? Maybe on a second viewing her motivation will be clear; however, a movie really shouldn't need multiple viewings to understand why a major sequence happens.
The one theme that gets hammered home a little too overtly is the concept of outsiders finding friendship and acceptance with one another. I noted this positively above, that this theme lends some seriousness and depth to the movie. And it is. However, I think every character has a moment when they literally say "I never had friends before; now I do." The sentiment is fine; it's great, in fact. But, it didn't need every character saying "you're my friends." That just seems like the writers didn't trust the audience to pick up on what isn't really a subtle theme to start with.
Notes
The original comicbook Guardians were introduced in 1969 as a group of insurgents in an alternate time-line, fighting in the year 3007 against the Badoon, an alien race that had conquered Earth and her colonies. They would appear in comics from time-to-time, sometimes in stand alone stories, other times as guest heroes in other titles. In 2008, after the events of Annihilation (a great series) and Annihilation: Conquest (a not-so-great series) the Guardians idea was rebooted, this time set in the primary Marvel continuity and in the present time. All of the Guardians in the film are from the reboot, although they are long-time characters in the Marvel universe. Groot, for example, was first introduced in 1960.
I was very happy to see Cosmos, the space dog, although a little bummed that he didn't say anything. In the comics he's a telepath and chief of security for Knowhere, the big floating Celestial head. Oh, yeah, Celestials!!!! Sweet!!! I also liked the little bit of extra weirdness with Howard the Duck. A team member for Guardians 2? Hmmm....
Verdict
Marvel took a bit of a chance with this. You have a director who never made a movie with this kid of budget and a property full of characters that even a lot of comicbook fans don't know. Marvel has been rewarded with an amazing film. While I think there are flaws, they are minor compared to just how much fun this movie is. I really had the same feeling watching it as I do watching the original Star Wars. It's big, sometimes goofy, but always fun and entertaining and fun, a film with its story-telling heart in the right place. Like Star Wars this film makes you care about the characters and leaves you wanting to spend more time with them. Everyone involved in this movie should be proud of the work they've done. This is one of the best movies of the year, regardless of genre. Go see it now.
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