After losing his crew in a fatal crash, legendary Rescue Swimmer, Ben Randall, 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, who is driven to be the best.

The movie's tag-line asks, "How do you decide who lives or who dies?" Apparently, the United States Coast Guards (USCG) have to answer that question every time they leap into perilous waters to save seafarers in trouble. You can't save them all, as they say, so in many ways, these young men and women trained as rescue swimmers have to play God, and that's not necessarily an enviable job.

While this is a good movie in that it pays tribute to the unsung heroes of the USCG, Andrew Davis' "The Guardian" lacks the kind of rousing human drama to earn the kind of audience reverence that the USCG deserves.

Which is a pity because a movie about coast guards could have been more original and found its mark. However, "The Guardian" tends to present a rather familiar story, made up of cliches and formula and bits borrowed from "An Officer and a Gentleman", "Top Gun", "Men of Honour", and all the other 'military training' movies we've seen through the years.

However, that doesn't necessarily make it a bad movie. It's entertaining enough, it has impressive stunt work - the sea rescues look harrowing, and Ashton Kutcher as the cocky recruit is convincing to some degree (although sometimes he looks on the verge of breaking into a comedy), but my complaint is that the ending is a little strange and the film tends to drag a little as it is a tad too long.

Kevin Costner looks like he got his part cut out for him here. If anything, this looks like a film tailor-made to ease his career into middle age. Where once he was young and burly, Costner, now in his 50s, takes the role of veteran US Coast Guard swimmer Ben Randall who has to pass the torch to a younger and burlier man - (Kutcher as Jake Fischer) - because he's well aware that age is catching up with him. After a failed mission where his entire team, the helicopter crew, and the people he's supposed to rescue are all wiped out, Ben is devastated, and has to pop pills to cope with the guilt that he's the only survivor. Sensing his emotional instability, Ben's superior puts him in cold storage, by sending him off to teach at the A-school, a Coast Guard academy in Alaska. There he meets his new students, including swimming champ Jake Fischer. Ben's teaching methods are tough and downright radical. But the school's instructor (Neal McDonough) and the commander (John Heard), allows for the bends in the curriculum because they trust the legend and holder of so many rescue records to make rescue swimmers out of the new intake.

From here on we see many sequences of mentor-student drills imposed, many of them downright mean and obviously designed to separate the men from the boys. By the end of the first few weeks, half the class is kicked out. But Ben has a particular eye on Jake to test him further, sensing that Jake is really there for himself and may not have the selflessness to save someone if they were in true jeopardy. The question is - will Jake live up to expectations?

Unknown to Ben, however, Jake is also wrestling with his own demons. Meanwhile, Ben has a personal problem - his wife (Sela Ward) has left him, tired of waiting for him to quit his job. Jake also has a subplot, and that is the conquest of the small town girl (Melissa Sagemiller ) who knows that A School students are just passers-by and almost always leave when they graduate. (This part smacks of "An Officer and a Gentleman" all the way).

As Jake, Kutcher is believable. I have never really liked Kutcher, despite his more serious roles on the big screen. There's something about his face that reminds me too much of his silly role in "That 70s Show", and unfortunately in "The Guardian", it's still there. But to give credit where its due, he did swagger well and even appeared potentially heroic, yet vulnerable, drawing sympathy from the audience. As for Costner, he looked relaxed in his role, his acting was, as usual, good but as usual, it isn't anything the Academy would take notice of.

On the whole, "The Guardian" is passable fare. It is an entertaining piece of formulaic film-making that works, simply because it is anchored by Costner and Kutcher, and several gripping action sequences.