PG-13, pretty much for making the term "a-hole" commonplace. This one is on the older side of the MCU. I know that there was an animated series for this movie. I am kind of flummoxed that this translated so well for kids. I mean, it's really not a kids' action movie. I'm not saying it is wildly offensive, but it is a tame James Gunn flick. Rocket is a terrible role model and Drax is a psychopath. That said, I kind of like that Henry really likes Rocket and Groot. Ah well, some battles are losing battles. There's also some dirty jokes in here. Also, per Disney, the opening is wildly depressing. PG-13.
DIRECTOR: James Gunn I don't like James Gunn...normally. There are film nerds who really dig James Gunn and I wish I had that kind of street cred. He seems so cool. Like, he doesn't care about the system. But then he became the system. I mean, making a Marvel movie is as legit as it gets nowadays. You are a full-on Disney employee, mouse ears and all. So how does someone who prides himself on indie anti-structure do with a property from Marvel that no one's ever heard of? (I have. I have and always will be a Marvel Zombie.) I guess by putting a rocking soundtrack to it. I have to admit. I don't love Guardians of the Galaxy as much as I say I do. I've seen it so many times. The first time, the wife and I drove out to the middle of nowhere to see it at a drive-in. We had to park a million miles away and the sound was garbage. You'd think that seeing Guardians of all of the Marvel movies would only be enhanced by seeing it at a drive in with all of its overt love of the late '70s and early '80s. Nope. Sheer garbage time. My wife wasn't in the mood to watch the movie, but I pulled one of my whiney nonsense things and watched it anyway. There are times that I think that I'm a bad husband. My kids are playing in the backyard with Lauren right now as I continue writing a review a day for a self-goal that doesn't really matter. This may have tainted the movie for me a bit, but I also knew that I also kind of liked it at the same time. I mean, I went into it already kind of hating James Gunn. I saw it under the worst possible circumstances and I still came out of it fairly entertained. Lauren swore that this movie was sheer trash, but even she likes it now. There's something really charming about this movie that allows it to work. There are terran Marvel fans and there are cosmic Marvel fans. I've always been about Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Men, not Annihilation Wars. But James Gunn made space fun. Guardians of the Galaxy works because it doesn't care about expanding the MCU. There's no one out there to run into besides Howard the Duck and Cosmo. Guardians of the Galaxy has one goal: have fun. That it does. This movie is about the soundtrack and jokes. I'm not saying that there isn't more meat to the Guardians. There is. But first and foremost, this movie is about having a good time, despite the fact that the movie is barely lit. I'm not making a shrewd observation here. Guardians of the Galaxy is Exhibit A in how a soundtrack can make a difference in a film. Everyone has this soundtrack. It's great. Like, I listen to it a lot. The weird thing is that I didn't really discover any of the songs on here. In isolation, these songs are annoying earworms. They have permeated popular culture. But when combined with this movie, something amazing happened. It has to be the juxtaposition of the imagery and the music. It's so odd how the opening credits of this movie might be the most memorable thing about the movie. (You and Baby Driver, dude.) The opening credits are preceded by SPOILER Peter Quill's mother dying and Quill using a hologram to show the people who have been killed in some sort of mass genocide. Creatures are trying to attack Quill and eat him. This movie has established the bleakest mood imaginable and then what happens? "Come and Get Your Love" by Redbone. Peter Quill and his Walkman has somehow become as important as Captain America and his shield. The even part is that the music is in world. Peter is experiencing the same emotions that we are. These rat creatures are no longer a threat, but rather a microphone. I mean, he punts a couple of those rat creatures around...and it's fun! Why? Because that song is catchy and contrary to the footage as it can get. That makes this movie super cool. Yeah, I don't like Gunn's other movies, but the one thing that he is consistent with is the fact that he is good at making things cool. I don't know what it is about indie directors coming into a corporate framework. I know that corporate filmmaking tends to be toxic according to the stories I've heard. But these are usually movies that kind of suck and come from Sony. (Sorry, I got into a debate about the Venom trailer and how much it looks awful.) But I keep thinking about the comments that Joss Whedon made about his time with Marvel. He knew how much money he was responsible with and he knew that he had to make something that would be successful. Marvel seems to hire all these quiet small time directors and they seem to know that they have to deliver. They bring the cool elements of their indie films and attach them to these major projects. Perhaps I'm turning into an old man with old man sensibilities, but I tend to like some of the entertaining studio films that they make. I mean, I didn't watch The Belko Experiment, but I heard that it kind of sucked. I really wanted to like Super, but that movie was just the worst. I mean, I tried. I tried really hard. But that movie is just not good. Same thing with Slither. These are taste things, I realize. But James Gunn with Marvel is just the best. Everything he writes on Twitter, I just hardcore nod. "Yes!" "Testify!" I love Marvel Gunn so so much. But Guardians 1 kind of suffers in the shadow of Guardians Vol. 2. How unfair is that? Guardians 2 is a near perfect sequel. It capitalizes on what works in the first one while treading new ground. But there are a few moments that are just blah in the first movie. The story in the first movie is threadbare. The MCU Phase 2 is so obsessed with setting up the Infinity Stones that it rests on those laurels a bit too heavily. (I know I said differently earlier. I'm discovering what I think about these movies as I write it.) As such, Lee Pace as Ronin might be another example of Marvel's early villain problems. I don't care about Ronin even though it is Lee Pace. He's one of those actors that I get really excited about and I know that he can do wonderous things with a part given to him. But Ronin is criminally underdeveloped. Compare Ronin to Ego and you can see where Ronin as a villain falls flat. The craziest thing is that Ronin is directly linked to Thanos. Thanos was teased in the post credit sequence of The Avengers. He's the guy who set everything up in that movie and Guardians of the Galaxy is the last movie before the next Avengers movie. Yet, Thanos doesn't really get a fair shake in this one. We get to see him act. We get to hear him talk. But Ronin is that much of a blah villain that Thanos almost seems wasted. How? This was the chance to really lock him into the canon of great villains. He is the second in command to Thanos! Ronin the Accuser! I mean, the guy smashes someone's head in with a giant cosmic space sledgehammer in his introduction. That should be the thing that is remembered forever. But then he's got this wishy-washy backstory. Really, his motivation is just a copy of Drax's motivation, and even Drax's motivation is kind of ambiguous. The second movie plays with Drax's pain, but no one really takes it seriously. (I'd like to comment on how much I love Drax. Drax is a perfect character and he should never change, but his dark motivations are so secondary to the story that it is almost silly that these come from the same character.) I know that Ronin is coming back for Captain Marvel and thank God. That character could be so cool, but right now he's kind of just a pile of hot garbage. I can see where the mistake happens. I keep complaining that superhero films burn out the good villains on the first movie, which is an origin story. This used Ronan, who no one cared about, but that's too much in the wrong direction. Anyway. While part of me gets really bored at the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie, I still get really excited to watch it when people bring it up. Gunn is still figuring out the dynamics of the characters in the first one. Some of the jokes don't land as hard as they do in the sequel. But the movie is still a marvelous amount of fun and I really do love it. It's just that it isn't the second one, which isn't the worst thing in the world. Can you get from this review that I really like the second movie? I really like the second movie.
1 Comment
THIS ONE HAS SOME SPOILLLLLLERRRRSS! Go see Avengers: Infinity War, and then visit literallyanything.net to hear our thoughts on one of the most insanely ambitious action movies of all time. It's worth it. There's a reason why it has the largest opening weekend in history.
PG-13, for sweet spy action. Captain America, but he's black ops. Does he have a codebook? Sure...but he threw it out the window. But then he went and picked it back up and put it in his front pocket because he's Captain America! It's not so bright as the other movies. America isn't painted in the prettiest of pictures. Things explode and there's a guy who is a living computer, but this movie is pretty tame for a spy movie. There is some intense action and my kids would probably get bored by it. PG-13.
DIRECTORS: Joe and Anthony Russo It's the Russos' entry point into the franchise. I shock a lot of people when I tell them that I'm pretty sure that this is my favorite movie in the series. I love this movie. I love this movie so much. I might watch The Winter Soldier more than I watch The Dark Knight. (Note: The Dark Knight might forever be the best made superhero movie. The Winter Soldier just hits so many personal notes for me that make it one of the most beloved superhero movies for me ever. Besides Superman: The Movie.) I think that everyone really likes this movie. I'm not saying that I'm alone in lauding this movie high and low. I just really like it more than most people like it. This movie does with Cap something that most people are afraid to do with Cap. Captain America was made to be a tool for propaganda. However, he kind of became the ultimate critic of America and that's pretty awesome. Now I'm going to get all of the people accusing me of being anti-American. I'm not that, I don't think. But I do like when a character is pushed outside of his or her genre into something far deeper. I mentioned The Dark Knight. Same deal. Superhero gangster movie. Captain America is first and foremost an action star. He's meant to be cheery and fight Nazis. He works really well there. Considering how well loved The First Avenger was, I'm really dumbfounded that The Winter Soldier didn't try hitting a lot of the same beats that made the first movie work. I know. World War II is over. He's in the future. The Avengers already happened. But how is this not a story about Cap trying to fight a time-travelling Red Skull (which I also want to see)? Instead, this is a black ops spy drama with hints of The Manchurian Candidate woven into it. The movie starts off (not the running sequence, which I love) with Cap in a muted costume with a muted shield. He takes on this undercover mission where he has to take people out silently and violently, a la James Bond. Oh my gosh, I love this so much. It's actually a little bit weird that wholesome Cap is willing to work with S.H.I.E.L.D., especially in this capacity. But it also makes an odd amount of sense. He's still a soldier, but fighting in what he has to view as a future war. He's saving hostages. He's still the Stars and Stripes, but he's also a very practical and tactical Captain America. And then what do we get? I remember when I saw this in the theater and I had to step back. I was watching a movie where Captain America was fighting Batroc the Leaper. Not only was he fighting Batroc the Leaper, but Batroc didn't come across as ridiculous. I read an io9 article recently that said that it couldn't forgive The Winter Soldier for changing Batroc so much. I don't meant to be crass, but shut up, io9. I love your reporting and you inspire me to like off-the-grid cinema sometimes, but the interpretation of Batroc the Leaper was as good as it was going to get. He is a profoundly silly character that really has the level of respect that he deserves in the comics. But Batroc might be a telling sign about what makes The Winter Soldier work. Captain America is inherently silly. He's way too optimistic. He's unashamedly a piece of propaganda. Superficially, he is such a boy scout that Superman can appear grim. But none of this is really true in the comics anymore. The Winter Soldier is heavily influenced by Ed Brubaker's run on Captain America. I loved Brubaker's run. It is absolutely cinematic storytelling. (If you look carefully, Brubaker even cameos in the movie.) Captain America is a character that has grown with age. A few characters stay fundamentally the same with slight tonal shifts. Some characters grow with their ages. I think that Batman and Captain America have done that. Batman, based on what age he is in, looks really different from the previous generations' Batman. The same can be said about Cap. Cap comics tonally shift quite a bit, but the root of the character stays the same. When Batman films become dark and gritty, it is because they are mirroring the tonal shifts in the source material. The same thing can be said about Captain America. It's why I have a problem with dark and gritty Superman. He is almost the same character that he's been for 80 years. (I know, those early books had him killing people. But lets put all the comics where he's a blue boy scout versus those that have him rip people in half and see which pile is higher.) P.S. I also love Superman. I like Phase Two in retrospect. This is the era where the genre experimentation really happened. I talked about The Dark World and the smart choices it made, despite lacking in complete success. What I can say is that Cap is an example of experimentation really working. I honestly find more in common to The Winter Soldier with the Daniel Craig Bond films. Both Bond and Cap live in fantastic worlds that don't really look like our own. Both guys should have died a long time ago. The idea of supervillains is inherently kind of stupid. But both the Craig Bond films and the Captain America movies treat these worlds as fantastic while looking for moments to ground them. There are explosions and helicopters and skydiving, sure, but the directors find excuses to treat them as realistically as possible. I don't know if there is a term for this. Grounding the fantastic? But it creates something really cool. We can kind of guess the rules of the universe. While I think that Spectre has some room to grow as a movie, there was a moment where I actually thought that they might have killed off James Bond. I forget what that moment was and I just really inspired myself to watch that movie again. But Captain America becomes kind of vulnerable. There are moments that larger than life and I can't believe. Cap's shield, first and foremost, is absolutely absurd. Spider-Man points this out in Civil War. But Cap nearly dies in this movie. I kind of believed it. There is a romance that exists outside of the realm of "They should get together." Okay, I don't know if Sharon is the most convincing love interest, but the male protagonist doesn't feel deserving of the female foil's love. Cap is honestly conflicted about the whole situation too. Black Widow just highlights all of the flaws of simply following orders in this story. That's great. It also is a brilliant set up for Civil War because we now know that Cap has a line that he cannot cross. That's awesome. The best thing that ever happened to the MCU is The Winter Soldier. SPOILER: I'm talking about the end of S.H.I.E.L.D.. It made Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. way more watchable and it also completely messes with the political landscape. I can't help but think that these Marvel movies are formulaic as get out, but they do some really gutsy things considering that they are so successful. Nothing is too precious in this series. The takedown of S.H.I.E.L.D. led to Nick Fury disappearing. That guy was everywhere for the longest time. I love Nick Fury. I love Sam Jackson. But I also think that taking that entire secret organization off the board was extremely smart. We don't always know that the good guys are always good and that the bad guys are always bad. People are more complex than what most action movies lead us to believe. There are moments where Cap's biggest problems are "How do I beat these guys?" but more along the lines of "I don't know who to punch." We get it. Putting Cap against a brawler villain will eventually lead to Cap beating him. But when there is a moral crisis, that's when Cap doesn't know how to operate. (Okay, Infinity War has him completely outmatched by Thanos, but that's a different scenario. One that I'll talk about hopefully this week or early next week.) There's this great moment in Winter Soldier where S.H.I.E.L.D. agents have to pull guns on each other. Not knowing who is Hydra is this tense feeling. The real S.H.I.E.L.D. agents know that Captain America stands for liberty and honesty and they fundamentally know that Cap wouldn't betray them. But they also know that they treated traitors and criminals as their friends. That moment reflects a difficult choice. There is this nerdy little guy who is in mission control. The guy probably had basic weapons training as a S.H.I.E.L.D. operative, but that's about it. He has to tell a guy who has a gun on him that he can't follow a direct order. I know that scene has been done before, but it is compelling for a reason. That scene works great and I absolutely dig it. Captain America: The Winter Soldier does this great thing where nothing is sacred. Storytellers shouldn't be beholden to people liking something. I mean, Avengers killed Coulson. I still love Coulson. S.H.I.E.L.D. doesn't exist anymore and one of my favorite characters is barely in the MCU anymore. I know that these are tough choices, but it makes the franchise grow when it should be at a standstill. This movie makes the gutsiest choice out of all of them. The individual elements also work. Things that I comment on in every review. Anthony Mackie as Sam Wilson is just a perfect addition to this universe. Scarlett Johansson (spelled it right the first time!) (Never mind. There are two T's in her first name.) really understands the character in this one and gets some depth. Robert Redford came back for a Marvel movie. That's something in itself. Sebastian Stan gets the story he needed and I love that. But these elements simply make a good movie. What makes The Winter Soldier great is that it chooses to break the mold and do its own thing. I love that the Russos replaced Whedon as the go-to guys in the franchise. They have this eye for drama that makes these movies compelling without losing their fun. That's just the best. |
Film is great. It can challenge us. It can entertain us. It can puzzle us. It can awaken us.
AuthorMr. H has watched an upsetting amount of movies. They bring him a level of joy that few things have achieved. Archives
April 2024
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