Review of The Guardian (2006) by Markb. — 28 Nov 2006

Yes, this military melodrama about the Cocky-But-Troubled-Recruit-Who-Makes-Good DOES travel the well-worn path of An Officer and a Gentleman (while stopping along the way to quote the most famous line in Speed).

But three factors need to be introduced in order to put this in its proper perspective: 1.) while The Guardian borrows from Officer, it runs a very distant second in this 2006 category to Annapolis, which STEALS from it wholecloth; 2.

) a viewing of many 1940s and 50s films in frequent rotation on Turner Movie Classics will attest that Officer isn't exactly a paragon of originality either, and 3.) The Guardian's obvious familiarity doesn't prevent it in any way from being as entertaining, rousing, exciting and ultimately quite moving as it is.

Part of this is due to the novelty of its setting: very few service movies center on the Coast Guard, which--and in the following statement I mean absolutely no disrespect toward the other branches of the US military--is focused on saving lives rather than taking them, and this in turn allows The Guardian to neatly avoid the repellent jingoism that made Top Gun so obnoxious.

(Philosophical question: can Quakers and other religious sects who are diametrically opposed to killing for any reason, opt to join the Guard if drafted or otherwise compelled to serve?). The two central performances work wonders: Ashton Kutcher, as a seemingly insensitive swimming champ who enters the Guard's rigorous training program, seems to draw on his awareness of how much he's (unjustly) disliked by some of the movie-going public in much the same way that Ben Affleck drew on the ups and downs of his own career to build an effective portrayal of ill-fated actor George Reeves in this year's earlier Hollywoodland, while Kevin Costner's work here as Kutcher's instructor, a Guard vet with his own shaky background, adds to an already impressive roster of films (Bull Durham, Tin Cup, The Upside of Anger and even Dances With Wolves) that establish him as our Number One interpreter of slightly burned-out, past-their-prime macho men who nevertheless still possess plenty of the right stuff.

But the real hero of this enterprise is director Andrew Davis, who's clearly the most humanistic American director of action films currently working; everybody loves The Fugitive, of course, but don't forget that Davis was also responsible for both Chuck Norris's best movie (Code of Silence) and Steven Seagal's (Under Siege).

He also did Arnold Schwarzenegger's underrated Collateral Damage, which unjustly suffered from being scheduled for release around 9/11 but turned out surprisingly to be a more thoughtful examination of terrorism and some of its causes than you'd expect from this genre and star.

..and then stepped completely out of form to give us the terrific Disney live-action kids' movie Holes. Davis's sheer professionalism in handling his actors, his staging of truly exciting action and rescue scenes while, unlike Poseidon, make it impossible to tell where the CGI ends and the real danger begins, and his sheer storytelling skill which enables him to get away with multiple climaxes that don't seem overdrawn or over the top are some of many qualities that makes The Guardian an almost perfect meat-and-potatoes movie; like most good solid comfort food, you shouldn't restrict yourself to a strict diet of it or even have it all that often, but it sure is satisfying when it's as well-served as The Guardian is.