A First-Hand Report from AMC’s Guardians of the Galaxy Chat

On March 8th, “Guardians of the Galaxy” star Chris Pratt, director James Gunn and the Marvel Studios Presdent Kevin Feige, sat down with AMC Movie Talk for a live chat.  During the half-hour panel, the crew answered Twitter questions and gave some insight into what we can expect from the film. I was one of the lucky people to be in the audience in Los Angeles.

guardiansofthegalaxy52cafa34e9700

When the trailer debuted a few weeks ago, it caused quite a splash online.  One notable part of this, was the trailer’s use of Blue Swede’s version of “Hooked on a Feeling”.  Acknowledging the strong reaction to the tune, James Gunn mentioned that the song as well ask other fun songs will be featured in the film, as part of a mixtape that Peter Quill has in his Sony Walkman.  As he explained, “It’s one of the things that sort of takes this sort of overwhelming…obtuse space opera and connects us to earth and grounds us a little bit in some sort of reality.”  Host John Campea then added a practical observation, saying that after watching, “you know you’re not going to get the song or the trailer out of your head for the rest of the day.”

The first question asked of Chris Pratt was what made him the right choice for Peter Quill/Star-Lord.  After admitting that he didn’t really get a good grasp on who the character was before heading to his audition, he said that Gunn told him that he was really looking  for someone to put their own spin on Quill.  Pratt then said, “What makes me right for this version of Star Lord is that it’s me… and I know how to do me.”

guardiansofthegalaxy530410a79a07b

However, Gunn remembers their first meeting a bit differently.  “I didn’t want to see him audition”, he said.  In fact, when Gunn’s casting director, Sarah Finn first suggested Pratt, Gunn responded, “the chubby guy from Parks and Rec?”  Ultimately, Gunn was proven more than wrong when Finn tricked him into meeting with the actor, saying, “He was reading for maybe 20 seconds… and I turned around to Sarah Finn and I said ‘he’s the one’”.

Similarly, Kevin Feige was asked what brought him to choose Gunn as a director, especially given his background with smaller, independent films. “It was less about them being smaller budgeted films and more about them being awesome,” he said, adding, it has served us well when we hire filmmakers who have done great work regardless of size or scale.”

guardiansofthegalaxy530439f483bdf

When asked about the potentially tricky tone and subject matter of the film, Gunn mentioned that, overall, this film is about the characters.  He explained, “to believe this movie, you have to fall in love with the characters.  You have to fall in love with a talking raccoon, and you have to believe that he actually exists— he is not Bugs Bunny in the middle of The Avengers.”

Since the release of “Iron Man”, Marvel Studios has had a huge string of hits.  Because of this, you’d expect they’d have a certain sense of comfort.  However, Feige doesn’t see it this way.  “We look at every movie like, ‘this is the last movie anyone is ever going to let us make ever, so let’s make it great’”, he said..

guardiansofthegalaxy530410a7b86b5

The good news is, according to the panel, if you enjoyed the trailer for “Guardians of the Galaxy, you’ll most likely enjoy the film itself.  Said Gunn, “Definitely that trailer is completely accurate to what the film is… and I can’t believe how well they captured the feeling of what we put together.”

But perhaps Pratt put it best when asked why moviegoers would enjoy the film: “I think you’re gonna love it because you’re smart”.

You can watch the entire chat below: