The Fall Guy (PG13)
126 minutes, opens on April 25
4 stars
The story: Stuntman Colt Seavers (Ryan Gosling) has quietly retired from show business following an accident. When former flame Jody Moreno (Emily Blunt), a director, asks him to work for her, he jumps at the chance, hoping it will lead to a lovers’ reunion. Producer Gail Meyer (Hannah Waddingham) tells him there is a hitch: The star, Tom Ryder (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), has disappeared. Colt must find the missing actor or Jody’s project will fail. The film is inspired by the Lee Majors television series of the same name (1981 to 1986).
When Hollywood makes movies about itself, it faces a credibility problem. Everyone knows that actors are fatuous, directors and writers are delusional and producers are sleazy, or so Hollywood believes.
The stereotypes are sometimes useful, for example, when deployed in lurid, self-skewering tell-alls like Babylon (2022) or satirical comedies such as Barton Fink (1991) and Tropic Thunder (2008).
Stuntmen and women, however, are the closest things Hollywood has to a type to which the average person can relate. As a bonus, these experts in dangerous special effects have a natural athleticism that looks great on screen.
Colt is a blue-collar man’s man surrounded by soft actors and their coddling handlers. He is a version of Cliff Booth, a similarly masculine stuntman played by Brad Pitt in the drama Once Upon A Time... In Hollywood (2019), the one who demolishes Bruce Lee (Mike Moh), whom the film portrays as an actor who has bought into his own myth of martial arts invincibility.
The difference between Colt and Cliff is that Colt is self-aware. Nursing a broken heart and the pain of knowing that his career is on the decline makes him endearingly mopey.
Gosling, perhaps not so coincidentally, played a stuntman-getaway driver in the crime drama Drive (2011), another film that makes the central figure an ultra-competent working-class hero.
Speaking of Drive, The Fall Guy makes a nod to that film, as well as shows too numerous to mention.
Colt and Jody are ex-lovers in their 40s, so their romantic interactions lean towards the regretful rather than the erotic. The subdued tone makes a good contrast with the turbulent action that surrounds the couple. A supporting cast loaded with actors with comedy credentials – Waddingham and Stephanie Hsu among them – gives the story plenty of airiness.
Director David Leitch, a former stuntman who is now a specialist in stories that are grounded in real stunts and fights (Bullet Train, 2022; Atomic Blonde, 2017), makes sure The Fall Guy puts the talent of his stunt team on full, jaw-dropping display. His concern for stunt quality is obvious, as is his respect for the craft.
Hot take: A high-quality work of breezy action that balances the silly with the serious while serving a crowd-pleasing set of flipped cars, rooftop falls and exploding choppers.
