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The Guardian

You know ‘em, you love ‘em. Take the gruff old guy who knows everything, pair him with the cocky young guy. Give ‘em a mildly tragic past, and stick them together in a training situation, and you’ve got a plot line that’s been rehashed dozens of times for Hollywood.

But instead of this being a tale of the police force, or of firefighters, or the FBI, this is a tale of the military. “How is that different” you ask? Because, this time, it’s the rarely seen Coast Guard that brings us our buddy training flick, in the form of The Guardian.

It tells the tale of Coast Guard Rescue Swimmer Ben Randall (Kevin Costner), a hardened veteran who’s turned down promotions to desk jobs (and lost his wife in the process) to stay in the frigid waters of the Alaskan seas. After a freak accident, his entire team dies, leaving him traumatized. His commanding officer gives him a choice: Resign, or teach the next batch of swimmers everything you know while taking time to recover.

Randall decides to teach, and proceeds to turn the training program upside down. One of the students suffering through the Ben Randall School of Rescue Swimming is Jake Fisher (Ashton Kutcher), a hotshot swim champ determined to show off his skills, in an attempt to move past a tragic past of his own. Through the weeks, Randall molds the ever smaller group, but focuses on Fisher, who ends up following Randall back to the Kodiak, and learning the true meaning of “So Others May Live.”

We’re so used to seeing the Marines, Navy, Air Force, etc end up on the big screen, that these days it doesn’t even make us bat an eye. The fact that Hollywood produced a movie focusing on the most forgotten of the 5 (yes, there are five) branches of the military, the United States Coast Guard, caught my attention, and felt like a tiny breeze hinting at fresh air. And these aren’t a bunch of wimps, either. While the US Coast Guard may not be the battle trained bravos that the rest of the military outfits are, USCG rescue swimmers, at least in this movie, go through hell to save others, even when everyone else has given up.

For the genre of “training” movie, this wasn’t that bad. It’s pretty predictable, with all of the military stubbornness ingrained in the lead characters, and with the added adjustments to make it flow with the Coast Guard theme.

As Ben Randall, Costner is at his stoic best. This isn’t a ground-breaking performance for him, and because of the watery theme surrounding this film, I kept thinking back to his character in Message in a Bottle. They’re very similar, in several ways that I won’t mention, to avoid spoiling the film. And I won’t even talk about Waterworld, except to say that this is better. Which isn’t hard.

Kutcher manages to brush off a little bit more of the goofball, gotta-love-me stereotype that he’s been stuck with, and while he still comes off as brash and cocky, part of that is the character he plays, and not really him. Instead of seeing a prankster making money off of his good looks, I see a developing young man, and a cocky Coast Guard recruit battling past demons to make himself the best. Sadly, while the role of Fisher is a type of breaking out for Kutcher, this didn’t have enough depth to completely rid him of his typecasting.

Costner and Kutcher do work together in these roles quite well though, and their chemistry was perfect as student and teacher, especially during a bar room brawl between the Coast Guard and the Navy types.

Probably some of the most interesting stuff in The Guardian was the training and rescuing itself. I’m not sure how accurately the film depicts actual rescue swimmer training, but if this is anywhere close, those guys go through hell in training, just to go through hell in real life rescues. I know boot camp is supposed to be a rough place, but throw in some of the most strenuous swimming and water exercises you can think of, and that might be a sliver of what these recruits go through. In one particular scene, we get to see the whole class shivering in a small pool full of ice water, to learn about hypothermia. I had to put on my jacket, it was that cold to watch.

As for the rescue scenes themselves, they’re probably the most exciting part of the film. The idea of jumping out of a helicopter into storm tossed waters sounds insane to me, but not only do these guys do it, they do it and save other people while they’re at it. Director Andrew Davis knows a thing or two about action sequences (I think The Fugitive had one or two…) and the helicopter drops and rescues were exiting, if Hollywood infused, evidence of the amazing save the USCG is capable of.

The Guardian is a great film for the Coast Guard, which hasn’t had a film produced about it in almost 50 years. It’s sure to put stars in not a few young swimmers eyes (the guy sitting next to me actually about to head to A-school notwithstanding), but as a film for the general masses, it’s a mediocre, if enjoyable, rewash of a long standing plot. Just throw in a few new faces, and some cold water.

My advice: Wait a few months, and curl up with a blanket at home to watch it.

Rating:

Erin Frost

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