Aesthetics in Guardians of The Galaxy

Aesthetics in Guardians of the Galaxy

Aesthetic/ Aesthetics is often known as the Philosophy of art and value. Aesthetics is can be personal, as a person can have their own opinion on something that they like, find appealing or beautiful; this could be the way that someone dresses (style), the way an artwork is viewed by the person that so happens to like it would suit their own personal view of 'aesthetic'. in other words 'aesthetics' is understanding beauty in both natural occurrences as well as man-made ones

Media is a massive part in our society and has a massive effect on our culture. It is literally everywhere. In relation to the topic of Aesthetics, this is highly implemented all throughout media.
such as: Films, photography, painting/art, video, design, sound, imaging and other forms of media. Directors of film often produce their work to their own aesthetic to provide the viewers with a visually stunning film. This can be done through; lighting, colour, how the shot is taken, the pace of the film, genre, character development etc. for example Tim Burton, the director of Edward Scissor Hands (1990) starring Johnny Depp as Scissorhands. This film really showcased his "campy" aesthetic. The unique film perfectly captured Burton's trademark Gothic like visuals as also seen in his (1999) Sleepy Hollow film. This goes to provide my statement behind personal aesthetics in the film industry.

Through online research, an article on the Philosophy of Aesthetics found on Britannica (https://www.britannica.com/topic/aesthetics) provides a short description of  the topic.
"Aesthetics, also spelled esthetics, the philosophical study of beauty and taste. It is closely related to the philosophy of art, which is concerned with the nature of art and the concepts in terms of which individual works of art are interpreted and evaluated". This valid description summarizes what Aesthetic/s is in a formal and compacted way.

I have chosen the Film Guardians of the Galaxy from the director James Gunn in the year 2014 following the famous Marvel comic series, to discuss how aesthetic has been implemented into this film. I have always been a big fan of the Marvel universe developed than none other than Stan (the man) Lee. I have grown up watching these films with a fast building love towards them. Out of all of the Marvel movies I have seen, the Guardians of The Galaxy mini series would have to be my favorite. The first movie starts off with the leading protagonist Star-Lord (Quill) in a hospital listening to a tape which provides the film with an amazing sound track filled with great classics from the 80s. This is already a great Aesthetic feature being the audio as the tracks help set the scenes weather it be romance, comedy, action or drama. The director James Gunn says that he tried to develop a post-modern aesthetic which was to provide a lot of contrast around the film between something very beautiful and something very ugly.
As the movie gradually takes us through exotic to very rugged and warn down/aged environments providing us with a greater sense of aesthetic towards the directors style implemented to the movies universe. Gunn said that the film was really about creating a space opera, that brought colour back to the type of movies he was pursuing to create. This shows that James Gunn is adding in his own personal aesthetic into his films, being colour and soundtrack as previously stated. This information was found in the movies featurette titled 'Aesthetic Vision'.

Aesthetics was applied to the characters in the film as they all had their own separate traits yet followed the same interest, for example: Groot, a very warm, happy character from a different origin to the other characters as he is a visual representation of nature as Groot takes the appearance of a humanoid tree figure that is lovable throughout the film. Where as the Antagonist being Ronan, an evil character with a dark ambition to end planets. The character of Ronin utilizes his evil characteristics and provides them to his overall look with a pale and gloomy skin tone and black clothing providing him with the Aesthetic feature of style to help show off his antagonistic role. and for a Marvel film you can only expect the best from the tech used on set. as Gunn posted to Facebook that the film was shot with the RED Weapon 8K and gradually moves on to saying that "when you're shooting a film at the level of Guardians of the Galaxy, the cost of film vs digital is negligible - for me its an aesthetic and creative choice", showing his aesthetic preference over film and to go digital to provide the movie with top quality visuals.

After gaining the knowledge to provide this information, I learned and developed a greater understanding towards Aesthetics in media and how it is implemented into a vast majority of the films that I thoroughly enjoy, and now I know why I am always happy to re-watch. I have also learned that the Philosophy of Aesthetics can be expressed throughout many aspects of life and can be a personal thing as well.

Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)