Netflix Saturdays : The Old Guard ( Movie Review )

Charlize Theron is back in beast mode and picks up right where she left off, from Atomic Blonde and Mad Max Fury Road ( Furiosa) in this Netflix twist on superheroes and immortality, The Old Guard. Adapted from the intense graphic novel of the same name by Greg Rucka and Leandro Fernandez, The Old Guard has Charlize Theron play a centuries-old immortal warrior named Andy, ably supported by a diverse cast and directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood, going behind the cameras for the first time, for an all-out action flick. 

And boy, does she come out smoking, giving us an epic action flick in what could be the start of an interesting franchise series. 

Along with three more of her immortal brothers-in-arms, Andy has been protecting mankind for centuries, (Funnily from themselves on countless occasions, deviating the course of history itself). The movie starts on an intriguing note - where Andy and her 'army' are lying dead in a pool of blood and spent shell-casings and she intones about the futility of living through such again - and again. Because unlike other superheroes, Andromache of Scythia isn't really happy about this superpower bestowed on her - that of immortality, considering it a burden to live through centuries of strife, human greed and stupidity age after age. And then in the current times, she has discovered that this young US marine in Afghanistan may be the latest "immortal" - new to her powers and realisation who needs to 'brought in'. 

What follows is an interesting mentor-mentee relationship that starts to grow between Andy and Nile. But not before they engage in one of the most epic one-on-ones - a brilliantly choreographed fight scene aboard an airplane hurtling to crash-down that will go down as one of the highlights of the movie. Nile essentially serves as the audience surrogate as she is brought up to speed on the legacy of this 'Old Guard' - where we are treated an amazingly well-stitched montage of events in the history (witch trials in England!)  and a peekaboo into Andy's past - introducing us to one of the first immortals, Qynh and Andy's first partner in crime.  

The story picks up pace right from get-go because the immortals are tricked by ex-CIA Copeland (Chiwetel Ejiofor ) to walk into a trap as genius maverick billionaire Merrick wants to capture these guys and use their DNA to spread this "power" onto the rest of the humanity. This thread becomes the main narrative as we hurtle towards an exciting climax with a lot of cat-and-mouse between the Old Guard and Merrick's mercenaries. 

Overall, touted as an out-and-out action flick, The Old Guard lives upto the expectations pretty well. A thin plot not withstanding, the movie is well paced with the action scenes thrilling with immediacy. I totally loved Charlize Theron who lets loose with all sorts of weaponry (including a badass 'labrys' (double-headed axe) and of course machine-guns, hand-guns ) The lull in the proceedings are set up well enough to hit you hard emotionally, with sharp, pointed dialogues between Andy and her new protege about this whole burden of immortality.  Kiki Lynn plays able support to Charlize - and the rest of the diverse cast. Merrick especially, played by Harry Melling exudes menace. ( Watch out for this guy!) 

Heart pounding pacing, great balance between exposition and action, dodging bullets, flying axes and terrifically choreographed moves like a heart-stopping dive off the side of a building - The Old Guard is set to develop into hopefully a great franchise ( given that interesting ending!) and we hope to see much more of Charlize Theron in action mode.