Guardians Of The Galaxy

Unless you're a real comic aficionado you probably haven't heard of Guardians of the Galaxy, which would go some way to explaining the two vastly different trailers I saw for it. The first portrayed James Gunn's new film as a dry take on the superhero genre, whereas the follow up suggested a more standard family space adventure. Unsurprisingly it turns out to be a mixture of the two, but it raises its head above the waterline by leaning more towards the former, which is a blessed relief in this era of comic book films just for the sake of it (looking at you Marvel - though, irony ahoy, this is actually from Marvel as well). Storyline wise it's a fairly basic space standard, that of a group of misfits thrown together by circumstances beyond their control who team up to defeat evil forces. If you feel you've seen that all before well, you have, but Gunn's direction coupled with his and Nicole Perlman's smart screenplay overcome that by producing a film which is just pure entertainment - in a completely bonkers type way. Gunn is best known for the low-key cult favourites Slither and Super, both films that took a sardonic approach to their specific genres. So it's no surprise then that he was hand picked to provide a light hearted touch to a field that needs to stop taking itself too seriously. The film itself is still epic in scope mind, with a nice blend of practical effects, motion capture and CGI which crucially still lend it an "earthly" feel, though the acting of some of the protagonists is lost amongst the pixels that represent them. The aforementioned misfits are "led" by Chris Pratt, who gives a great performance anchoring the whole film with a routine of heart and comedy. Pratt pitched Quill as a mix of Han Solo and Marty McFly, and that's pretty much what he delivers. On the minus side the plot does get a bit over-stuffed at times and the ending makes little sense, but what with Guardians being one of the more obscure parts of Marvel's back catalogue you don't have time to worry about such things, and if a film can pull off one of the biggest laughs I've heard from an audience this year based on a tree smiling you know you're onto a winner. Perhaps the most impressive thing of all though is that Gunn and co have managed to pull off an almost unbelievable human emotion come the films finale. They've given us a Marvel film where you actually want to see a sequel to it. Rating: 8/10.