Retro Review: “Guardians of the Galaxy” | Cinematic Magic
Last evening, I accidentally watched “Guardians of the Galaxy”. Again. For maybe the fourth, or fifth time.
Why?
Well, I recently purchased my first 4K TV and have been looking for content that can fully utilize the amazing color saturation and resolution of this device. I searched on Amazon Prime Video for “”4K” content, and a bunch of titles came up, including this one. Now, of course, if I had been on Disney+ it would have come up as included content. But, here, I can watch it because I bought it many years ago. Before the Mouse House’s streaming service even existed.
Sooooo glad I did.
Is Disney doomed?
You see, there is a lot of angst, or agita, or both about the future of our greatest Entertainment Company, Disney. Will Bob Iger be able to save the company, given that it has “lost its way” and, most importantly for Wall Street, hasn’t been turning a profit in recent years? But Movies have that magical ability make us forget the bad things that are happening in the world. At least for their run time.
And “Guardians” reminded me, with its tidy sub two hour run-time, breezy plotting and excellent dialogue that, well, this (and Iron Man, and a few others) are why we fell in love with Marvel Studios in the first place. One of my favorite reviewers, Simon Dillon, recently came out with a wonderful essay basically saying, well, if you don’t like “Back to the Future” you should probably have your head examined.
I would say the same about “Guardians”. It is so good, so funny, so heart-wrenching, and has such good CGI that, well, if you don’t like it, just fold your tent and go home. Seriously. Oh, and the sound track slaps, to use a Gen Y term of art.
“Starlord? Never heard of you.”
I don’t know whether it was the brilliant 4K picture, or just that I was in the right mood, but the opening scene where Peter Quill, aka “Starlord” has to watch his mother die in a hospital bed made me cry. Given all of the other MCU shenanigans involving these characters that have come in the ten years since “Guardians” came out, both directly (GofthG II and III) and indirectly, re-living this poignant Origin Story was just so beautiful. So real. So, well, Cinematic.
Following this emotional scene, Peter is sucked into a spaceship and the film cuts to an adult Peter, played with great verve by Chris Pratt, dancing to a classic 70s tune from the Mixtape that Mom made for him, as he searches for some orb that will net him a lot of Credits. Possession, or lack thereof, of that orb provides a great deal of the motive force for the plot over the next hour or so of the film. What, exactly is it? Or, more importantly, what is inside it? And why would a freaky dude called “The Collector” — played with scenery-chewing relish by Benicio Del Toro — pay four bazillion Credits for it?
Why indeed.
Don’t call it The Space Squad
What James Gunn’s film does so, so well, is introduce the eponymous Guardians, and why they have to Guard the Galaxy efficiently, hilariously, and with great aplomb and dialogue. The best of the Marvel franchise has seamlessly inter-woven personal stories that really matter, like Iron Man’s uber pace-maker that helps him be a super hero, while actually keeping him alive, with Parsec-jumping action. And “Guardians” really helped set the standard for this.
Gamora, played with real, and green, gravitas by Zoe Saldana, is burdened with a fake father, Thanos, who, we will learn, killed her real father. ‘GMO Racoon’ Rocket, whose own origin story will be so wonderfully assayed in GofthG III (my review here: https://medium.com/@ewarren61/flow-my-tears-the-cgi-workstation-said-279535b8af54) has a large chip on his tiny shoulder. The “big lug” of the film, Drax, is simply about revenge against Cree sociopath Ronan. And “tree of few words”, Groot — voiced in an almost Zen-like performance by Vin Diesel — will have one of the best Action set pieces in the entire MCU. But I won’t spoil that for you.
About 40 minutes into “Guardians” there is a scene where our five heroes saunter down a walkway after coming together, and, well the actual Guardians of the Galaxy have been born. It is a brilliant image, played on screen in slow motion, like a scene from a 70s action flick, and has all the more emotional resonance, because Gunn’s direction, and all of the players' acting, have very much earned it.
But wait, there’s more
This being the MCU, however, “Guardians” has to not only have its own story arc, but it has to set in motion multiple plot strands that will be inter-woven into other Avengers and non-Avengers films. Most importantly, we will need to find out, at some point, why Peter Quill can hold the (blank blank) and not explode or dissolve. Watching this film after having seen many, many MCU entries since, it is easy to see where the breadcrumbs are laid. But it wasn’t so obvi the first time around.
Our crew will ultimately be set against Ronan and his weird starship, The Dark Aster (great name, BTW) and will enlist the aid of Glenn Close and John C. Reilly to save an entire planet from what Ronan calls “cleansing”. Another hallmark of the MCU is the willingness of fairly well-known actors to take somewhat minor parts in order to be able to brag to their kids, and grandkids that they were in a Marvel film. Witness Sly Stallone, Djimon Hounsou, and many others. Close and Reilly, here play important roles, but are very much not the stars of the show. And they seem just fine with that.
Stream it or skip it?
If you haven’t already seen “Guardians” you really need to watch it. In 4K if possible, or HD, on any of several platforms, including its home, Disney+ (now bundled with Hulu!).
If you don’t like Superhero movies then why are you even reading this Review? But, seriously, even if you don’t like Superhero movies, or MCU movies, or even movies with a great star from he legendary “Parks and Recreation” mockumentary style comedy series (and BTW I call you un-American if you don’t like Chris Pratt, LOL), or even if you just don’t like loud action films, please at least give this one a shot.
I mean, it name-checks the 70s punk-adjacent, female-forward hit “Cherry Bomb”. Who does that?
