Guardians of the Galaxy
In theory, I should have been an early voice among bloggers when it came to Marvel’s most recent film, since I saw it during a Thursday night pre-show. In reality, I just had too damn much to do before a planned trip to see friends and family in Ohio to get it done, and had too much fun just taking it easy to write the review in Ohio. Now, “Guardians of the Galaxy” is the latest in a stunning run of franchise hits for Marvel, and I’m desperately late to the party. No matter; I still want to review it because late or not, I have something to say about it.
“Guardians of the Galaxy” is, no doubt, the strangest cast of characters yet to enter the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but in all honesty, it’s probably the most lovable. Up until now, the focus has been on larger than life Heroes with a capital “H”– Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, and Hulk, with Black Widow and Hawkeye showing great ability in action, as well. By comparison, the loopy leads of “Guardians” seem like blue-collar average joes, and yes, I’m including the talking raccoon and sentient tree, as well. No special abilities to speak of per se, but when they’re working together, they’re certainly a force to be reckoned with. The fun, however, is when they aren’t working together. There’s been a meme going around the web likening James Gunn’s “Guardians” crew to fellow Marvel auteur Joss Whedon’s “Firefly,” and it’s an apt comparison, one which could also be done with the band of rebels at the center of the original “Star Wars” trilogy. This isn’t a homogenized cast of characters but a genuine ensemble of misfits, each with a unique backstory and circumstances that make them interesting.
Let’s start with Star Lord, the name Peter Quill (Chris Pratt, mixing wicked wit and charisma even better than he did in the winter smash, “The LEGO Movie”) gives himself to seem tough. Quill is taken from his Earthly home when he’s young by a band of smugglers and thieves run by Yondu Udonta (Michael Rooker) after his mother dies. He’s got a walkman and a mix tape his mother gave him, as well as a gift she gave him on her death bed. Now, Quill travels the galaxy as a soldier of fortune type, looking for artifacts to shop to the highest bidders. He’s not exactly Indiana Jones, though, as our first look at the adult Quill makes clear, but he can get in trouble just as easily. That he becomes the leader of a group that includes Gamora (Zoe Saldana), a daughter of Thanos (Josh Brolin), the Mad Titan; Drax the Destroyer (Dave Bautista, in the most surprisingly great performance in the film), a muscular warrior with a need for revenge; Rocket (Bradley Cooper), a sentient raccoon with a wicked sense of humor; and Groot (Vin Diesel, making the most out of a quiet role), a walking tree who is Rocket’s best friend. When most of this crew meets up on Xandar after Quill is unable to unload his loot, you wouldn’t expect them to turn into a crew for good when they find themselves in the crosshairs between Xandar’s Nova Corp and a Kree rebel named Ronan (Lee Pace), who wants Quill’s bounty for his war. At the start of the film, Gamora is working with Ronan along with her sister, Nebula (Karen Gillan), but the sisters quickly find themselves on opposite sides when the artifact is none other than one of the Infinity Stones, which we have already seen in action by way of the Tesseract (in “The Avengers”) and the Aether (in “Thor: The Dark World”). Needless to say, we’re in “end of the world” mode here, Marvel fans.
There are a few things that really stood out watching “Guardians of the Galaxy” for the first time, including the sarcastic sense of humor (which goes further than in any of the previous Marvel films) and rich characters, but nothing stood out quite like the soundtrack James Gunn compiled for the film. Rather than just relying on just an original score (or AC/DC, a la the “Iron Man” films), Gunn selected a specific song soundtrack that would emphasize fun and define the character of Star Lord. Gunn’s choices had us from the first time Blue Swede’s classic “Hooked On a Feeling” played on the first trailer for the movie, and by the time the film had Rupert Holmes’s “Escape (The Pina Colada Song),” Raspberries’s “Go All the Way,” and the Jackson 5’s “I Want You Back” over key moments in the story, Gunn had us hook, line and sinker with one of the great compilation soundtracks in film music history. (Yeah, I said it.) He has an original score as well, by regular collaborator Tyler Bates, and the composer does a great action-adventure score that is up there with the best Marvel scores thus far, but it’s the song soundtrack is the real musical discovery of this film. Hopefully, Gunn will be able to come up with something just as special for “Guardians of the Galaxy 2” in a few years.
It’s very easy to see why everybody took to “Guardians of the Galaxy.” With the other Marvel films (with the possible exceptions of “Iron Man” and “Thor”), there was a sense of the expected and predictable, even if it came with some surprises (see “The Avengers” and “Captain America: The Winter Soldier”), but Marvel had never taken a risk like they did with “Guardians.” The characters were D-list members of the Marvel stable, and with the space rebel setting, it would have been very easy for the film to turn into a lesser cousin of the aforementioned “Star Wars” and “Firefly.” But Gunn (making the transition to blockbuster director after smaller films like “Slither” and “Super”) and co-writer Nicole Perlman have a smart ear for genre conventions, and how to subvert them, which “Guardians” does at every turn. This is the juiciest screenplay Marvel actors have had to work with since Joss Whedon’s “Avengers” set a high standard, and the cast (which includes John C. Reilly and Glenn Close as members of Nova Corp, Djimon Hounsou as Ronan’s right hand soldier, Korath, and Benicio Del Toro as the ancient Collector) takes it very seriously, while maintaining a wicked sense of fun, while Gunn proves himself more than capable in building a blockbuster production in the Marvel mode that expands the brand, and takes their Cinematic Universe into bold new directions. It’s a winner in every sense of the word, and I can’t wait to see where the Guardians go from here…even if they are just a bunch of a-holes.
