54591: The Fall Guy

As a child, I adored The Fall Guy (1981) as brought to life by Lee Majors. He was gruff but loveable, constantly trying to do the right thing and just as constantly thwarted by forces beyond his control, punished, in essence, for trying to be a good guy. And the whole thing existed against the backdrop of 1980s Hollywood, with the titular Fall Guy spending his days as a put upon stuntman while moonlighting as an equally put upon bounty hunter. He’s basically the 1980s network TV answer to the hard boiled PIs of old Noir cinema, a Sam Spade but seen in the golden light of “morning in America.”

Maybe Howie will get to be in the sequel.

It in no way bore any resemblance to reality, and that is one aesthetic which I was thrilled to see carried through by director David Leitch and writer Drew Pearce in the new iteration of The Fall Guy (2024). Colt Seavers, as inhabited by Ryan Gosling (who looks like he could be Major’s grandson), is just as put upon and unlucky as the original incarnation, with an attitude of “Aw, come on, what now?” shining through each of his improbable setbacks/setpieces throughout the film.

Come on, you see it, right?

To be clear: there is absolutely nothing grim or gritty or dark about this movie. This isn’t 80s nostalgia fed through a Gen-X irony filter. It is pure, unadulterated fun. The soundtrack is over-the-top, with Bon Jovi, KISS, and Phil Collins featured prominently, and the movie wears its heart on its sleeve. Not only is it a love letter to the men and women who make stunts possible, it’s a little bit of a middle finger to the producers calling the shots. It’s also a surprisingly non-toxic take on masculinity.

Without spoiling anything, the whole narrative is driven by Colt’s attempt to unravel and mitigate the terrible choices made by another man, driven by ego and insecurity. And it is only through Colt’s healthy, open, and loving friendships is he able to come out on top. Gosling’s Colt Seavers could not be further removed from his turn as “Driver” in Drive (2011). He’s inverting that earlier character, a nameless stunt driver who eschewed emotion, identity, and deep connections to the world around him, relying on graphic violence to extricate himself from the criminal web he found himself in. Colt would run away from that stone-eyed psycho just as quickly as his product-placement GMC could carry him. Was Leitch playing with Gosling’s history when he gave him the roll in The Fall Guy? Was this…stunt casting?

Obviously, when you’re making a $150-million movie you don’t just cast your lead because “hey wouldn’t it be cool if we did this to give film nerds something to chatter about online?” But still, it was interesting to me to see that juxtaposition of character types pulled off by one actor at different points along his career trajectory.

Not pictured: Gosling’s trajectory

The Fall Guy (2024) begins with a heavy dose of voice-over exposition and moves with lightning speed to the inciting event. Seavers is working on a big-budget action movie, and on the brink of a life-changing love affair with camera operator/girlfriend Jody Moreno (played by a Greta Gerwig-inspired Emily Blunt). A stunt goes wrong and Colt instead has a life-changing back injury which takes him out of the film world and results in him ghosting Jody. Ouch, and double ouch.

Fast forward 18 months, and Colt is called back into action by a former boss and asked to work on a new big-budget action movie, this time directed by Jody. If this sounds like a ridiculous contrivance concocted to put Blunt and Gosling into more scenes together and just let them chemistry all over the place, you are correct. They have an incredible presence together that is by turns playful and biting and warm and vulnerable and just utterly charming. It’s like watching Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert in It Happened One Night, and if that’s all the movie had going for it, it would still be an enjoyable rom-com.

She’s your boss, dude.

Of course, the contrivance to get Colt to the movie falls apart immediately when he discovers that Jody did not want him on the set and had no idea he was coming. Sparks fly, grievances are aired, tears are shed, Taylor Swift is played. Colt and Jody’s emotional arc is the spine of the movie, and unlike Colt’s it never breaks. These are the couple you want to share a lake house with next summer, if they can just get their shit together.

The movie also has an incredible supporting cast, including Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Tom Ryder, the star of the movie and the actor Gosling was stunting for before his accident, Winston Duke as Dan Tucker, stunt coordinator on the film-within-a-film and Colt's best friend, and Hannah Waddingham as Gail Meyer, the producer who brings Colt out of retirement.

Such Britishness.

One thing to mention, as regards casting: at no point during this movie does Hannah Waddingham sing one single solitary note. And this movie features an extended sequence of people singing at karaoke. And she’s right there! She’s right there in the karaoke bar talking about how karaoke is just people murdering her favorite songs and she never lifts one freakishly talented finger to take the mic and show them how it’s done. It’s like Checkov’s gun but with an amazing voice.

I don’t get it, but whatever.

The film does tap into the natural talent of its director, fortunately, in the jaw-dropping stunts that punctuate the narrative: flaming boats flying through the air, armored cars flying through the air, Ryan Gosling flying through the air… there’s nothing Leitch won’t send flying through the air in this film, and I’m here for it. There are also some extended fight sequences, which is to be expected when your director is one of the minds behind John Wick, but even these are suffused with humor and style. There’s one sequence in particular where a drugged Colt fights a group of baddies at a nightclub all while hallucinating the most beautiful animations. The fight is the sort of thing you might have seen in a Bourne movie, but with the playful nature of a Beverly Hills Cop overlaid on the action.

The trailer didn’t spoil this, but I will.

It’s not how fights go down in the real world. I assume. In the world of The Fall Guy, people have huge fist fights and bounce back immediately. People get shot at and they don’t develop PTSD. It really is the sort of action-without-consequences mindset that made the original The Fall Guy (1981) work. Don’t think too hard about it. Just enjoy the wild, death defying stunts, the convoluted whodunit framework, Emily Blunt’s performance of “Against All Odds (Take a Look at Me Now)” and the insanely winning chemistry she shares with Gosling. It’s an eminently enjoyable movie experience, even if the final result feels at times a bit shallow. What you do get is well worth the time it takes to get there.