GAMES: GameSpot | GameFAQs MUSIC: Last.fm | MP3.com MOVIES: Metacritic | Movietome TV: TV.com
Home | About Metacritic | About Metascores | What's New | Wireless Versions | Discussion Forums | Advertising Inquiries | Contact Us | RSS
Metacritic.com: We Deal With Criticism
     Help
> Switch to Advanced Search  
Film Video/DVD Music Games TV

Film

Upcoming Release Calendar
Weekend Box Office
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
How Metascores Are Calculated
Discuss Film In Our Forums

 

Wide Releases

sort by name sort by score

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

 

Limited Releases

sort by name sort by score

67 $9.99
75 24 City
66 Adoration
74 Afghan Star
48 Alien Trespass
56 American Violet
82 Anvil! The Story of Anvil
57 Away We Go
81 Beaches of Agnes, The
62 Big Man Japan
28 Big Shot-Caller, The
78 Boys: The Sherman Brothers' Story, The
55 Brothers Bloom, The
82 Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country
xx Call of the Wild
63 Cheri
62 Cherry Blossoms
63 Dead Snow
65 Departures
18 Downloading Nancy
58 Easy Virtue
70 End of the Line, The
77 Every Little Step
64 Examined Life
80 Food, Inc.
38 Gigantic
56 Girl from Monaco, The
67 Girlfriend Experience, The
87 Gomorrah
89 Goodbye Solo
63 Great Buck Howard, The
79 Harvard Beats Yale 29-29
xx Home
82 Hunger
91 Hurt Locker, The
16 I Hate Valentine's Day
81 Il Divo
54 Is Anybody There?
71 Jerichow
58 Julia
74 Lemon Tree
36 Life is Hot in Cracktown
40 Limits of Control, The
42 Little Ashes
64 Lymelife
50 Management
57 Merry Gentleman, The
66 Moon
35 New York
62 Not Forgotten
xx Offshore
78 O'Horten
64 Outrage
40 Paris 36
54 Pontypool
71 Pressure Cooker
52 Quiet Chaos
83 Revanche
67 Rudo y Cursi
86 Seraphine
65 Sex Positive
70 Shall We Kiss?
77 Sin Nombre
59 Sleep Dealer
74 Song of Sparrows, The
54 Stoning of Soraya M., The
82 Sugar
84 Summer Hours
61 Sunshine Cleaning
28 Surveillance
42 Tennessee
63 Tetro
64 Throw Down Your Heart
80 Tokyo Sonata
63 Tokyo!
70 Tony Manero
74 Treeless Mountain
88 Tulpan
74 Two Lovers
83 Tyson
83 U2 3D
60 Under Our Skin
69 Unmistaken Child
69 Valentino: The Last Emperor
22 What Goes Up
45 Whatever Works
57 Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

 



Printer-Friendly Version Email This Page Discuss In Our Forums

Guardian, The
Buena Vista Pictures

Guardian, The reviews
Critic Score
Metascore: 53 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
8.2 out of 10
based on 29 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 88 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

MPAA RATING: PG-13 for intense sequences of action/peril, brief strong language and some sensuality

Starring Kevin Costner, Ashton Kutcher, Melissa Sagemiller, Bonnie Bramlett, Clancy Brown, Sela Ward, Neal McDonough, John Heard, and Brian Geraghty

After losing his crew in a fatal crash, legendary Rescue Swimmer, Ben Randall (Costner), is sent to teach at "A" School, an elite training program for Coast Guard Rescue Swimmers. Wrestling with the loss of his crew members, he throws himself into teaching, turning the program upside down with his unorthodox training methods. While there, he encounters a young, cocky swim champ, Jake Fischer (Kutcher), who is driven to be the best. (Touchstone Pictures)


GENRE(S): Action  |  Adventure  |  Drama  
WRITTEN BY: Ron L. Brinkerhoff  
DIRECTED BY: Andrew Davis  
RELEASE DATE: DVD: January 23, 2007 
Theatrical: September 29, 2006 
RUNNING TIME: 136 minutes, Color 
ORIGIN: USA 

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

83
Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach
The Guardian is that rarest of cinematic commodities: an action movie displaying brains and heart and the opportunity for its stars to do something more than keep the narrative flowing between explosions.
Read Full Review
75
Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell
The Guardian doesn't offer too many surprises. Except for one: it's genuinely well-made and, at least when it comes to the character Ben Randall, kind of moving.
Read Full Review
75
Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold
The film's grueling training sequences have a perverse fascination, and, though he's nothing special here, Kutcher is probably the most appealing he has been in a big-screen role.
Read Full Review
70
Variety Joe Leydon
The overlong but involving drama has obvious cross-generational appeal.
Read Full Review
67
Austin Chronicle Josh Rosenblatt
A surprisingly engaging character-driven picture: not quite Ingmar Bergman, of course, but not Michael Bay either.
Read Full Review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Kate Taylor
With high seas and crashing waves created by Canadian special-effects company Fusion CIS, there's nothing wrong with the nail-biting side of the equation featuring a sequence of distinct maritime accidents; it's the rest of the plot that is taking on water.
Read Full Review
63
Chicago Tribune Jessica Reaves
Sometimes you want to buy an extra-large popcorn and settle in for a big budget Hollywood blockbuster replete with entertaining explosions, undemanding dialogue and completely unrealistic action sequences. If all that sounds like gloriously uncomplicated fun, The Guardian is your movie.
Read Full Review
63
Premiere Scott Warren
Ultimately a valentine to the unsung heroes of the US Coast Guard and it's probably long overdue.
Read Full Review
63
Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea
It's not easy being macho while you're shivering like a frozen puppy, but Kutcher pulls it off.
Read Full Review
63
New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman
At its best when its heroes race furiously toward their missions, most of which involve jumping out of a helicopter into surging waves.
Read Full Review
60
The Hollywood Reporter James Greenberg
That the film doesn't rise above the formulaic is a particular disappointment as these stunningly brave Rescue Swimmers deserve a film as daring as they are.
Read Full Review
60
The New York Times A.O. Scott
An action movie, a basic training movie, a swaggering sea adventure, a home front melodrama and an inspiring tough-love heroic teacher fable. If the aggregate of all these movies is exhausting and occasionally overwrought, some of the parts are stirring and effective, though not exactly fresh.
Read Full Review
60
Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek
As a story of courage and personal growth, The Guardian is perfunctory, a saga of character building that could (and may, advertently or otherwise) serve as a Coast Guard recruitment vehicle. But it's far more interesting as a tale of two faces: Kutcher and Costner have a kind of visual chemistry that's just as elusive as the other kind. And the connection and contrast between them remind us that Hollywood isn't as forgiving of older male actors as we like to think.
Read Full Review
58
The Onion (A.V. Club) Tasha Robinson
Tries tremendously hard to win audiences over with manly derring-do, exciting action, and impossible-obstacles-overcome uplift. And it's undeniably compelling for minutes at a time
Read Full Review
58
Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
The movie represents an earnest effort to compensate for all the love the media has shown to firefighters and other land-based first responders in recent years with little thought to the Coast Guard; the drama also crashes on wave upon wave of clichés.
Read Full Review
50
Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez
I'm not suggesting Costner and Kutcher should run out and remake "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" just yet, but in The Guardian, the two actors turn out to complement each other well enough to make a lot of this supremely derivative and formulaic picture go down better than it should.
Read Full Review
50
Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
Costner has the stoic routine down pat, and there are some spectacular action sequences of helicopter rescues on the high seas, but Kutcher is in way over his head.
Read Full Review
50
Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern
The kind of inspirational movie that Hollywood made about the Army, Navy and Marines during World War II. Now, with inspiration in short supply, it's the Coast Guard's turn.
50
Los Angeles Times Kevin Crust
The overly familiar plot points also make the film feel a little dated.
Read Full Review
50
USA Today Scott Bowles
Don't be surprised if, in the middle of The Guardian, you get an overpowering sense of déjà vu. Assuming you've seen "An Officer and a Gentleman," "Top Gun" or any of the myriad basic-training films Hollywood churns out, you've seen The Guardian.
Read Full Review
50
Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer
The only performance worth watching is Costner's. Now that he seems resigned to being something less than an A-list luminary, he is often modest and affecting.
Read Full Review
50
Village Voice Scott Foundas
The Guardian is neither serious enough to take seriously nor flashy enough to get by on thrills alone. Jerry Bruckheimer, where art thou?
Read Full Review
50
ReelViews James Berardinelli
There's nothing in The Guardian that audiences haven't previously been exposed to ad nauseam.
Read Full Review
50
San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle
When Costner is good, as he is here, his acting has a purity to it, an unspoken moral dimension. Underneath the sensitive, stoic facade is a loquacious, intellectually alert actor with an encyclopedic understanding of the film tradition he occupies: the rugged, humble movie hero, embodied by the likes of Gary Cooper and Henry Fonda.
Read Full Review
50
Boston Globe Wesley Morris
The point of all this solemnity may be to pay serious respect to those rescue swimmers, who courageously look after errant kayakers or victims of Hurricane Katrina. But what we get in exchange is a movie that feels too much like a Coast Guard recruitment film. Who wants to pay to see that?
Read Full Review
50
TV Guide Ken Fox
A predictable amalgam of every military-academy movie you can think of.
Read Full Review
40
Film Threat Pete Vonder Haar
Davis and company need to be taken to task for giving us a movie that makes rescue divers, arguably among the most death-defying of professionals, boring.
Read Full Review
40
Washington Post Stephen Hunter
Ultimately, The Guardian veers off into slobbery touchy-feeliness, and the tone becomes mock-religious, almost liturgical.
Read Full Review
38
New York Post Kyle Smith
The men who made The Guardian strive to be the averagest of the average - and don't quite succeed.
Read Full Review

What Our Users Said

Vote Now!The average user rating for this movie is 8.2 (out of 10) based on 88 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Lisa L gave it a10:
This movie was AMAZING! I was so inspired and it just makes you realize how much we take for granted the amazing work people do. the acting was really good too. I'm reminded again of how great of an actor kevin costner and ashton kutcher are.

Andrew S. gave it a0:
What a horrendous movie! The critics were right when they said it was nothing special... The entire movie is a cliche piece of crap that tries way too hard to be epic and meaningful. The script is just laughable. The last twenty minutes were the best directed, but they were so boring and just full of action. Most people only like the film because of stupid action. It doesn't mean anything. Bad, bad, bad movie.

Bill b gave it a4:
When watching this movie, I feel like I'm just watching a more modern version of An Officer and a Gentlemen. Yes, some of the parts were inspiring and uplifting, but I've seen inspiring and uplifting and it's making me bored!

Daren W. gave it a10:
WOW, after this movie I realize we take the Coast Guard for granted. Great movie, entertaining!!! I saw the critics reviews; WHAT! The whole family loved this movie... Watch it and judge for yourselve... Also do not understand the negative reviews!

Name and address withheld gave it a0:
This had to be the worst movie ever! About some stupid loser who joins the coast gaurd. That falls in love with a ugly lady who is a drunk. It was such a crappy movie that Icried. I highly doubt that the true coast gaurds drink like pigs on there free time!

Martin W. gave it a1:
What an embarrassing movie. Scripts must be few and far between. I can understand Ashton Kutcher having to accept a part in a predictable movie such as this, because lets face it, he's really B grade. But, I thought Kevin Costner may have been able to pass. Has his career stooped to this? Flag waving, chest beating, hi five hand slapping crap!

Bj C. gave it a9:
Excellent. A good reminder of what Coast Guard (and others) goes through to save lives. Kevin Costner was great. It's so nice to have a movie that isn't all filth, violence, gore, and sex. I recommend this movie to anyone that wants to be entertained.

Read more user comments...

Discuss this movie in our forums

Return to top of page
Home | FILM | DVD/VIDEO | MUSIC | GAMES | TV | Forums | About Metacritic metacritic.com

Popular on CBS sites: iPhone 3G | Fantasy Football | Moneywatch | Antivirus Software | Recipes | E3 2009

About CBS Interactive | Jobs | Advertise

© 2009 CBS Interactive Inc. All rights reserved. | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use