Time: 125 Minutes
Cast:
Charlize Theron as Andy/Andromache of Scythia
KiKi Layne as Nile Freeman
Matthias Schoenaerts as Booker/Sebastian Le Livre
Marwan Kenzari as Joe/Yusuf Al-Kaysani
Luca Marinelli as Nicky/Nicolò di Genova
Chiwetel Ejiofor as James Copley
Harry Melling as Steven Merrick
Veronica Ngo as Quynh
Director: Gina Prince-Bythewood

A group of mercenaries, all centuries-old immortals with the ability to heal themselves, discover someone is onto their secret, and they must fight to protect their freedom.

I had heard about The Old Guard for some time. All I knew about it was that it was a Netflix action movie based on a comic book and starred Charlize Theron in the lead role. I wasn’t in any rush to get around to watching it, I wasn’t really expecting much going into it. It turned out to be better than I thought it would be, despite some of its issues, I thought it was quite entertaining and generally well made.

There was a little more to the story of The Old Guard than I thought there would be. I just thought it would be an action movie about immortals. While there was that, there was an interesting mythology and lore that was given, especially with the characters. There is however a lot of exposition explaining the characters’ pasts, especially with the use of flashbacks. Some of the flashbacks were quite effective, others were a little cheesy. The plot itself is quite predictable and nothing special, which is disappointing given the potential the setup and premise has. I guess what made it feel somewhat fresh was how they handled the relationships between the main group. Nonetheless, some of the characters get more attention and depth than others, and it does feel like the plot could’ve been a lot better. There are for sure some cliches, from recycled plot points to familiar dialogue. The pacing was also slower, and that was good and bad at the same time. While I appreciate the movie not rushing into just being a typical action movie and focussing on some character moments, there were parts where it does slow down just a little too much. There wasn’t as much action as I thought there would be, and I do think that it worked towards the film’s benefit. The ending was setting up a sequel, and I’m on board with that and hope that it happens.

The cast really do well on their parts. Charlize Theron is in the lead role and plays her part greatly, her performance alone makes the movie worth watching. Additionally, Theron is no stranger to action and performs very well in those scenes. KiKi Layne is also great in one of the lead roles as a newcomer to this world of immortals. The rest of the immortals played by Matthias Schoenaerts, Marwan Kenzari and Luca Marinelli are also quite good. Chiwetel Ejiofor isn’t given much to do, but he also played his part very well. Harry Melling also plays up his hammy cliché villain pretty well, even if he really didn’t have much to work with.

I haven’t seen any work from Gina Prince-Bythewood, but she directed The Old Guard pretty well. The action is one of the highlights of the movie, it’s choreographed well, brutal, and very well shot. If there’s anything that takes away from them, it’s that the bad soundtrack was pretty bad. The movie is filled with pop songs which really didn’t fit the movie, and many of them play during the action scenes. The songs themselves weren’t necessarily bad, it’s just that they really didn’t work well with the action scenes they were placed in, and they were more than a little distracting.

The Old Guard was a bit of a surprise, I don’t consider it to be great by any means and there were parts with the script which could’ve been much better, but it was entertaining for what it was. It was directed well, featured some solid action scenes, and the cast perform well. If you like action movies then I’d say that this is one to check out for sure. I’m definitely interested in follow up movies, hopefully they’d reach the potential that the first movie didn’t.