I'm going to start by saying I think I'm too old for this film. Yes, at 34 years of age I'm too old for Guardians of the Galaxy. I finally get the whole "I am Groot" thing that I've been hearing so much about, which is a relief but it's also not the clever reference I thought it'd be (it's all one of the main characters can say and they say it throughout the entire film - you kids these days are sharp!). I guess that's the small positive I can pull out of this experience - I get the "I am Groot" thing at last.
I'm not sure what the text version of a shrug is but, I assure you, if there was one I'd be typing it now.
Well, I should go into a Star Wars prequel-type rant next about hype and expectations and blah blah blah but, you know what, this is all I've come to expect from these Marvel films. They all get good reviews and I turn up/sit down to watch them and find myself confused as to what everybody else has been seeing.
I've genuinely started to believe that people are watching different films to me.
Captain America? The Avengers? X-Men: First Class? Iron Man? All the same: they're even more flat and two dimensional than their comic book origins with the odd good performance to save it from utter pointlessness. Well, apart from Captain America, I can't remember a damn thing about that one. And don't ask me to go see Thor or The Incredible Hulk. I'm done.
But don't get me wrong, I'm not judging Guardians of the Galaxy as part of a loosely connected series of films, because I really haven't invested enough time in any instalment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe to do that. It just has that same... urgh... you're going to hear me say "flat" a lot in this review, so if you've got a problem with that word or don't get what I mean then it's best to avert your eyes now while there's still time.
So in I go to Guardians of the Galaxy expecting it to be the tonic to my gin of couldn't-give-a-rat's-ass. I'd heard that James Gunn had turned it all around and given us non-believers the first truly unique and inspired Marvel movie.
Has he? Can you all point out which bits those were exactly?
Guardians of the Galaxy is basically The Fifth Element meets Mass Effect 2 (a very good video game that felt like Star Trek: The Next Generation meets Attack of the Clones) meets, hmmm, what's the third thing? I need a third thing. I'll have a think about that and let you know at the end of this review. But the first two really hit the nail on the head. Trust me.
Apart from the fact that they were fun.
And I didn't find Guardians of the Galaxy fun.
Well, a couple of bits maybe.
Since when did screenwriters forget how to disguise exposition in dialogue? I've heard of the phrase "hanging a lantern on it" for when you can't figure out how to write your way out of a corner but is it really necessary for characters to make speech after speech after wearyingly boring speech about their backstory and motivation?
We don't need it.
Mention it once. Invest in a line or two about backstory and motivation and then move on.
But we're not so lucky with Guardians of the Galaxy. If you've not seen it yet then prepare yourself for a script full of footnotes that you won't care to hear and your brain, funnily enough, will naturally ignore.
And that's where one of the film's biggest flaws lies: it's tone. As mentioned above we get a lot of speech making. Serious speech making. Then you get a funny quip here and there. Then you get some violence. Then you get a pratfall.
It goes on like this.
And the funny quips are real bargain basement one-liners too, but in a strange way like they had something funnier originally but for one reason or another they kept changing them as the producers fought over which was the least offensive or something. Now I don't know if that actually happened but that's what it feels like. I get the sense from the ADR work that the actors were fed up with being called back in to re-record their lines for the hundredth time.
Oh the actors. Well let's get right onto that shall we...
They're fine. In fact they're all pretty damn good except for one: our lead. Yes, Chris Pratt is awful. And this comes back to the tone thing again. Is he supposed to be awful? If he was cast based on his work in Parks & Recreation then I don't know how James Gunn and his team were expecting anything else. His character in Parks & Recreation is dumb and insincere but, well, I don't think Mr Pratt is genuinely dumb and insincere in real life but that's what his acting style seems to be regardless of the role.
It's what he does.
He's likeable though, I'll give him that. In the way that he's likeable in, yes, Parks & Recreation, but likeability on its own can't carry the weight of an entire film.
So, yeah, there's another tone problem. Who are we rooting for here? Our lead is likeable but dull but maybe he's supposed to be. Is this a Big Trouble In Little China thing where the protagonist is actually the sidekick but he just doesn't know it? I'm not sure.
Is it all a joke?
The weird thing with this film is that we're constantly being told that our heroes are idiots and useless and deadbeats. But they're not really. They're all actually pretty good at what they do. At no stage do any of our main characters show any weaknesses other than when it's necessary to dispense exposition. Now that's an important point: the character moments in this film are not there to make you connect with them, they're purely there to feed you information.
I know that's kind of the point of dialogue but there's really very little attempt to sugar coat it here.
So what shall I talk about next? Oh yes, let's segue awkwardly into the middle of this review by talking about the beginning of the film. Why is that there? In fact, why do we need the first twenty minutes of this film? We don't really, but it's there because we're all stupid and we need this stuff hammering into our brains.
I didn't like the overly emotional hospital opening, even though it showed the origin of our hero. It just felt out of place and set things off on the wrong foot for me. Perhaps for personal reasons.
So now I've got that unpleasant bit off my chest I'm going to talk about music. The music in this film is great! But it's diagetic. That's right, we can't just have old fashioned music playing on the soundtrack in a science fiction fantasy action adventure, we have to have it explained practically why it's there. Yes, our protagonist has an old walkman with songs his mother used to like and that's why we have old music in the film. It can't just be there, which would have been great, it has to be explained.
Thanks, guys.
So what have I covered so far? Script, Tone. Characters. Opening scene. Music. Well, I think that's about it.
Guardians of the Galaxy is a mess. It has the same special effects you'll see in any film out there at the moment, so I can't really comment on that either positively or negatively. You know what it'll all look like, don't you? So visually it's a mess only with flat, point-and-shoot camerawork (I really wish it was an interesting mess), tonally it's a mess, narratively it's straightforward but ironically could have done with being a mess, the dialogue's boring, the characters are boring, the story's boring (magic orb of death... yawn) but for some reason everybody loves this film but me and a handful of others.
We meet under the bridge at midnight once a month to hold copies of The Fifth Element to our breasts and weep for a time when films still looked and felt interesting even though they were a bit rubbish.
Oh yes, and the third thing this film feels like is Star Trek Into Darkness because while it's well made, has a few fun moments, at least has some real sets and real people in it, it's also dumb, incomprehensible and eventually pointless.
Just utterly, utterly pointless.
Unless you're Marvel, then the point is lots and lots of money.
Or a kid who can now go to school and confuse their teacher by answering "I am Groot" to every question they're asked in class.
Bet that's fun for them.
Sigh.
Oh and John C. Reilly's as bad as always too. I still don't get why people like him. We get multiple scenes of his stone, dull, lifeless face mumbling lines he doesn't seem to care about.
Again... sigh.
I didn't say "flat" too much in the end, did I? Hmmm, I might go back and add some more.
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