To the Coast Guard With Love: The Guardian
Kevin Costner, Ashton Kutcher

Review by Breanne Boland October 5, 2006 Issue

From its opening credits to its closing slideshow of photographs of the Coast Guard’s efforts in post-Katrina New Orleans (accompanied by a schmoopy Bryan Adams song), this movie is probably the most expensive and elaborate military recruitment video ever made. This is not to say that it lacks virtue altogether — the rescue scenes are riveting — but any good points in the movie are obscured by the oppressive and unavoidable point of view that pervades the film.

Kevin Costner plays Ben Randall, a seasoned rescue swimmer so good he’s been kept in active duty long past the normal retirement age. When a helicopter accident kills all of his team, leaving him the sole, guilty survivor, he’s transferred to the Coast Guard’s school for aspiring rescue swimmers so that he can get back into fighting shape. There he meets cocky student Jake Fischer, played by Ashton Kutcher, a man as arrogant as he is talented. From there we’re treated to a primer of rescue swimmer training — all noble torment and tests of endurance. For a few painful minutes, it even switches to a music video format. Through this part of the movie, the tone switches from a tale of scrappy rookies to a tale of a Noble Calling and Great Sacrifice. It never recovers.

Which is, of course, not to say that being a rescue swimmer isn’t a noble calling. However, the film brims with such respect and awe for this line of work that it ends up being a love letter to this lesser known department of the military, rather than the proper story such a dramatic vocation should inspire. It’s an unfortunately toothless take on a unique way of life. Its difficulties are alluded to but never properly explored, leaving the fine rescue sequences feeling shallow and unsupported.

Kutcher is good here, playing the kind of good-natured, motivated goofball that he does so well. Costner, as the withdrawn, gruff mentor, displays the kind of stoicism he’s done well in westerns. Alas, the script doesn’t serve the players half as ably.

There’s a good action movie to be had from what this material and the experiences of the people who actually do this. Unfortunately, this isn’t it. It starts off innocuously enough, but as it gets more inspirational and less exhilarating, it goes from good, to tolerable, to eye rolling disbelief. By the film’s end —which I am dying to reveal because it is so excruciatingly tidy and manipulative — I was actually making small gestures at the screen so I wouldn’t disturb my fellow moviegoers with my derisive remarks.

I just hope after all this the Coast Guard gets the rescue swimmers it apparently so desperately needs.

Bottom line: no rescue for the audience, unfortunately.

Coming Attractions

October 6

Employee of the Month – a goofy stoner comedy starring Dane Cook, Dax Shepard, and inexplicably the ridiculously omnipresent Jessica Simpson. I like simple loopy comedies, and I’m annoyed that I can’t go to this one now.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning – the most recent version was a present-day remake of the ‘70s original, and this one is set in the ‘70s, so that means that Leatherface and crew were spawned while the other one was… ugh, never mind.

The Departed – one of the first of the wave of serious fall films, this one a double-crossing, who’s-the-mole crime drama set in Boston. With Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, and Jack Nicholson, and directed by Martin Scorsese.

October 13

The Marine – I don’t know what Robert Patrick is doing here – paying the mortgage, probably – but he’s flanked by two WWE alums, and Vince McMahon produces the film. You already know if you’re going to see this.

Man of the Year – Robin Williams in sly mode, playing a late-night political talk show host who runs for president and unexpectedly wins. Snarky Robin Williams is better than slapstick Robin Williams, so this should be worthwhile.

The Grudge 2 – the sequel to the Sarah Michelle Gellar-starring horror flick, but with a different leading woman. Still, the people behind the cameras are more or less the same, so if you liked the first, chances are you’ll be pleased here.

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