THE FALL GUY Review
"An entertaining couple hours at the movies, even if much of it works better on paper than in the actual film."
You really can’t get a better pairing of filmmaker (and former stuntman) than putting David Leitch in charge of a movie loosely based on the popular ‘80s TV show, The Fall Guy, starring Lee Majors, or at least a movie that uses that same title.
Ryan Gosling plays Colt Seavers, one of the top stuntmen in Hollywood, who we meet while he’s on a shoot with his camera op girlfriend Jody (Emily Blunt) before a horrible accident takes him out of commission for 18 months, ending their relationship in the process. Colt is convinced to return to action by the manager of Tom Ryder (played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson), a major superstar he frequently stunt doubles, in Jody’s directorial debut, an epic sci-fi film called “Metal Storm,” although Colt soon learns there are ulterior motives in play, as the star has vanished.
Making a movie that combines a number of disparate genres like romance, action, comedy, and crime, as The Fall Guy tries to do, can be tough, although Edgar Wright has managed to do just that with many of his films, including Scott Pilgrim and Baby Driver. Leitch, directing a screenplay by Drew Pearce (Iron Man 3, still my least favorite Marvel movie ever), doesn’t have quite the skills to pull off such a mélange of genres quite as effectively as needed to be, but when The Fall Guy works, it really works.
The best scenes, unsurprisingly, are the ones between Gosling and Blunt, since they honestly have the type of chemistry that gets people wanting to see them on the screen together. These moments are scattered throughout the film, as much of it, we’re following Colt looking into the disappearance of Ryder, but make no mistake that casting these two actors is frequently what makes The Fall Guy work where it might not have otherwise.
One of the film’s not-so-secret weapons is Ted Lasso star Hannah Waddingham as Gail Meyer, the film producer and manager of Taylor-Johnson’s star Tom Ryder, who generally seems to have her own motivations for wanting Colt around. I was even more thrilled when Stephanie Hsu from Everything Everywhere All at Once shows up to help Colt, but she has such a small role that only pays off much later…. in an end credits scene, in fact.
The problem is that there are so many aspects to the movie that should have worked better or delivered on the promise of doing something different with a rather ordinary idea from television. With Leitch’s involvement, you’d expect a lot more jawdropping action scenes than we actually get, since some of the fights and chases seem fairly standard with only a few moments where you feel like you’re watching something impossible to pull off. (Leitch takes a cue from Jackie Chan by using the film’s end credits for a montage of watching some of these incredible stunts being done on set by his talented stunt team.)
Similarly, the music choices could have been better across the board. Instead, the movie uses Kiss’ “I Was Made For Lovin’ You” (or variations on it) a lot, to the point where it grates on the nerves. It does not help that song was just used prominently in Godzilla X Kong, just a coincidence really, but it did beat Leitch to the punch.
Ultimately, The Fall Guy is an entertaining couple hours at the movies, even if much of it works better on paper than in the actual film, which has many fun moments but doesn’t leave that much of a lasting impression.
Rating: 7/10
The Fall Guy opens nationwide on Friday, May 3 with previews on Thursday night.
Oh, and I just heard this song by Euros Childs for the first time the other night and thought it was appropriate: