The Old Guard is a 2020 American superhero film directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood and written by Greg Rucka, based on his comic book of the same name. The film stars Charlize Theron, KiKi Layne, Matthias Schoenaerts, Marwan Kenzari, Luca Marinelli, Harry Melling, Van Veronica Ngo, and Chiwetel Ejiofor, and follows a team of immortal mercenaries on a revenge mission.
The Old Guard was released on July 10, 2020, on Netflix. It received generally positive reviews from critics, with praise for the action sequences and Theron's performance.
Meanwhile, in Afghanistan, U.S. Marine Nile Freeman has her throat slit while taking down a military target during a house search, only to recover without a scratch. Later, she shares a disturbing dream with the other immortals, who are then alerted to her existence, as they experience dreams of any new immortals until found. Andy tracks down a confused Nile and extracts her from Afghanistan before military personnel can transfer her for further testing.
Copley shows the video of the ambush to pharmaceutical executive Steven Merrick, who sends operatives to capture the team. Andy brings Nile to a safe house in France, where she meets the rest of their team. She is told about the female immortal Quynh, the first of Andy's comrades, who was captured, accused of witchcraft and lost to them when cast somewhere into the sea in an iron maiden, and has been continually drowning ever since. The group also reveals that they are not truly immortal: their ability to heal eventually stops, without warning, which happened to a previous immortal, Lykon.
The group is ambushed by Merrick's forces; Joe and Nicky are captured while a seemingly deceased Booker is left behind. While Booker regenerates, Andy kills all of their assailants but is wounded and realizes she is not healing. Booker locates Copley, while Nile separates from the group to reunite with her family.
Andy and Booker confront Copley, only for Booker to betray Andy and shoot her, arguing that Merrick might find a way to end the immortality they have both grown weary of. As they are captured, however, Booker realizes that Andy is not healing. Copley has a change of heart when he sees that Merrick is willing to torture the immortals indefinitely to study them. Nile, having realized Booker sold out the group, arrives too late to intervene, but she convinces Copley to assist her in a rescue mission. She storms Merrick's London office and after she frees the rest of the immortals, they fight their way out through the rest of Merrick's security, with Nile saving Andy from Merrick by grabbing him and jumping out of a window, killing him.
As punishment for his betrayal, the group sentence Booker to loneliness - forbidding Booker from contacting them for 100 years. The rest of the group meet with Copley, who explains how his research revealed their past missions had a greater effect than they ever knew, with the descendants of people they had rescued going on to help the world in many different ways. With renewed faith in their existence, the group tasks Copley with maintaining their secret and finding missions where they can have effect.
Six months later in Paris, a depressed and drunken Booker is astonished to find Quynh in his apartment.
Casting
- Charlize Theron as Andy / Andromache of Scythia
- KiKi Layne as Nile Freeman, a former US Marine who served in Afghanistan
- Matthias Schoenaerts as Booker / Sebastian Le Livre, once a French soldier who fought under Napoleon
- Marwan Kenzari as Joe / Yusuf Al-Kaysani, a Muslim warrior who had participated in the wars against the Crusades, as well as Nicky's lover
- Luca Marinelli as Nicky / Nicolò di Genova, an Italian Crusader from Genoa. He and Joe started off as enemies, but became lovers after discovering their immortality
- Chiwetel Ejiofor as James Copley, a former CIA agent grieving the loss of his wife from ALS
- Harry Melling as Steven Merrick, the wealthy CEO of a pharmaceutical empire
- Van Veronica Ngo as Quynh, an immortal ally from Andy's past
- Anamaria Marinca as Dr. Meta Kozak
- Joey Ansah as Keane
- Micheal Ward as Lykon
In March 2017, Skydance Media picked up the rights to adapt the comic The Old Guard, written by Greg Rucka and illustrated by Leandro Fernandez, into a film. Rucka's contract stipulated that a major scene highlighting the romance between the characters Joe and Nicky from the comic book must also be in the film adaptation.
In July 2018, they hired Gina Prince-Bythewood to direct with Rucka adapting his comic book to screenplay and Skydance's David Ellison, Dana Goldberg and Don Granger producing. With a budget of about $70 million, Prince-Bythewood became the first black woman to direct a big-budget comic book film. In March 2019, Netflix picked up worldwide rights to the film and agreed to finance it with Skydance. Charlize Theron joined the film and also produced with Beth Kono, A.J. Dix, Marc Evans and Skydance's David Ellison, Dana Goldberg, and Don Granger.
KiKi Layne was confirmed to star in the film after Netflix picked up the rights. In May 2019, Marwan Kenzari, Matthias Schoenaerts, and Luca Marinelli joined the cast of the film. In June 2019, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Harry Melling, and Veronica Ngo joined the cast of the film. At Ngo's request, details of her character were changed from the comic book. In an interview, Rucka said, "When Veronica was cast, she said I'm not Japanese, I'm Vietnamese. [Director Gina Prince-Bythewood] reached out to me and said 'Can we accommodate that?' and I was like, 'Absolutely.' Noriko becomes Quynh, Quynh is now Vietnamese. It really was as simple as wanting to honor that, and be respectful of that". The other change to the character was the character's death. "In the comic, Quynh/Noriko is washed overboard during a storm rather than deliberately drowned. According to Rucka, that was partially a logistical change to save money. But Quynh’s new 'death,' solidified by Prince-Bythewood’s suggestion of the iron maiden imagery, served an important narrative and tonal role as well".
Principal photography for the film began in Europe in mid-May 2019. Filming took place in Morocco and the United Kingdom, including at Shepperton Studios in England. Sandwich in Kent was used as a double for the French town Goussainville. Sandwich's Discovery Park doubled as Merrick Pharmaceutical headquarters throughout the film. Filming in the famous pub The Prospect of Whitby took place on July 10, 2019.
Volker Bertelmann and Dustin O'Halloran composed the film score. Lakeshore Records released the soundtrack on July 10, 2020, coinciding with the film streaming release.
The Old Guard was released on July 10, 2020 on Netflix. It was the top-streamed item on the site over its first weekend. It ranked second and fourth the following two weekends.
On July 17, Netflix reported the film was on pace to be viewed by 72 million households over its first four weeks, among the top 10 most-successful original launches in the platform's history. That October, Netflix reported the actual figure to have been 78 million. In November, Variety reported the film was the seventh-most watched straight-to-streaming title of 2020 up to that point. In December, The A.V. Club reported that due to "the way Netflix operates, we don't even know whether The Old Guard is a hit in any measurable sense. Netflix itself claims that 78 million households have watched it, and I have no idea whether that's a good number".
