Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
Directed by James Gunn
Light years from Earth, 26 years after being abducted, Peter Quill finds himself the prime target of a manhunt after discovering an orb wanted by Ronan the Accuser.
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9 films that influenced Guardians of the Galaxy
What critics say influenced Guardians of the Galaxy
Or Star Wars meets Flying High.
Okay, “The Edge of Tomorrow” and “Lucy” weren’t bad, but “Guardians of the Galaxy” is full of what made movies fun back when “Jaws” and “Star Wars” were igniting the genre.
Guardians of the Galaxy (Disney, Blu-ray+Blu-ray 3D, DVD, VOD) is based on one of the more obscure Marvel Comics to get the big screen treatment, but everything about the film suggests a filmmaker trying to recapture the sense of energy and color and sheer fun of Star Wars and the pop space opera.
With a healthy amount of references to Star Wars, allusions to things like The Wild Bunch and The Dirty Dozen, and way more jokes, heart, and character development than anyone could have imagined, Guardians is a hell of a fun two hours.
The screenplay boldly acknowledges the existence of both “Star Wars” and “Indiana Jones” – two obvious influences here – but it works in bringing Gunn’s passion for the material to the surface.
Blessed with a loose, anarchic B-picture soul that encourages you to enjoy yourself even when you're not quite sure what's going on, the scruffy "Guardians" is irreverent in a way that can bring the first "Star Wars" to mind, in part because it has some of the most unconventional heroes — would you believe a raccoon and a tree?
Here he borrows frankly and freely from Star Wars, as well as Raiders of the Lost Ark and other '80s classics, adding a large dose of the sick-and-twisted science-fiction humour familiar from Futurama or 2000 AD.
The film opens with a “Raiders of the Lost Ark” homage, as intergalactic thief Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) tries to heist a mysterious orb from a forbidden planet.
The roguish human played by Pratt is part Han Solo, part Indiana Jones — an opening scene in which he dances across a cave to "Come and Get Your Love" references the rolling boulder in the opening of "Raiders of the Lost Ark" — and Bradley Cooper's vivid voice acting makes for a persuasively misanthropic CGI raccoon.
(The moment in which he steals it is reminiscent of “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” which is fitting given Quill’s enthusiasm for pop culture.)
Much of Guardians of the Galaxy, in fact, is pitched at the tone of that much-debated scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark, in which Harrison Ford’s Indiana Jones, confronted by a sword-wielding assassin, calmly shrugs, pulls out his pistol and shoots the guy dead.
You can feel everything from Raiders of the Lost Ark to Star Wars and Back to the Future in Guardians 's DNA.
There's no reason for that not to inspire cautious tiptoeing, for it not to motivate a precise tonal copy of what's worked in films like Iron Man and The Avengers , and ultimately for it not to lead to a zillion-dollar effort to ensure a solid, uninteresting base hit, creatively speaking.
The movie unfolds in the same universe as Iron Man and The Avengers and the other interconnected Marvel-comics films, but it’s set somewhere in the cosmic margins, away from Earth, off to the side.
While set in the Marvel universe of comicdom, Guardians of the Galaxy isn’t the biggest untapped property in the stable, but as they did launching Iron Man, it was ready-made to fill a niche; it feels like equal parts “Farscape,” “Firefly,” and the few family-friendly parts of Pitch Black (Vin Diesel much?) while putting an original spin on it.
Pratt seems to be doing a sort of homage to Captain Mal Reynolds of “Serenity,” which perhaps explains Nathan Fillion’s walk-on in the prison sequence.
Thor! Yes, the suits took a risk by handing that franchise over to Joss Whedon , who had only directed one feature before: 2005’s decidedly non-blockbuster Serenity .
It’s fair to note, however, that Guardians bears more than a passing resemblance to Star Wars, not to mention Raiders of the Lost Ark and Joss Whedon’s outlaw sci-fier Serenity.
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Alas, making fun and profit of the George Lucas saga is a tactic about 30 years behind the curve; Mel Brooks did it, with giddier panache, in the 1987 Spaceballs.
Guardians of the Galaxy plays less like a Marvel Studios commodity and more like a two-hundred-million-dollar version of 1980’s sci-fi cable staples like The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension or The Ice Pirates.
To take the most generous view, it’s fair to call Guardians a celebration of genre junk: The movie’s director — James Gunn — also directed Slither, an unashamed and reasonably well-received B-movie from 2006.
My Adult Voice was all ready to point out that cowriter-director James Gunn helmed the cult favorite Slither and the clever, pitch-dark superhero spoof Super.
What makes “Guardians” such a grand summertime treat is the cheeky nuance imbued into the script by Nicole Perlman and director James Gunn, whose other most notable film was the sly horror flick “Slither.”
But director Gunn — who also made the low-budget satire "Super" and the underrated horror movie "Slither" — is good with his large cast.
It was pretty risky for Marvel to choose low-budget cult filmmaker James Gunn (“Slither”) but the gamble pays off as Gunn and talented crew craft a space opera that is instantly familiar while blazing a very original trail in the overcrowded superhero genre.
(Marvel UK via YouTube) Anyone familiar with Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning’s drolly offbeat Marvel comic series should be thrilled to see their characters fall into the hands of drolly offbeat director James Gunn (“Slither,” “Super”).
Benicio Del Toro (2012's " Savages ") pops up as the enigmatic, bleach-crazed The Collector, but is in and out too briskly, while Glenn Close (2011's " Albert Nobbs ") and John C. Reilly (2011's " We Need to Talk About Kevin ") are noticeably underused as Xandar's trusted council head Nova Prime and Corpsmen Dey.
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In fact, it’s better than “Iron Man 3.” Equally as refreshing is the innocence in “Guardians.”
It feels fresher than much of ‘Phase Two’, which is what they’re calling the era that joins The Avengers to its sequel, and has so far included Iron Man 3, Thor: The Dark World, and Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
Two of the strongest Marvel movies, Iron Man 3 and Captain America: The Winter Soldier, have been released through Phase 2, and now, arguably its greatest effort has been unveiled.