The Fall Guy — spectacular stunts and familiar charm make for explosive entertainment

When The Fall Guy opened in cinemas, its box office debut was a bit of a damp squib. This is unfortunately par for the course for action director extraordinaire David Leitch.

While he is co-creator of the wildly successful genre gold standard John Wick, and his franchise work — Deadpool 2 and Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs and Shaw — were huge blockbusters, his original productions — Atomic Blonde and Bullet Train — have struggled with commercial success, even when they earned strong reviews. And now The Fall Guy appears to be suffering the same fate, despite being a hugely entertaining action-romcom romp that makes for the perfect big-screen date night.

Read more in Daily Maverick: Bullet Train with Brad Pitt — murder on the Osaka express

To add insult to injury, The Fall Guy is technically a franchise entry, as Leitch and writer Drew Pearce took inspiration from the mostly forgotten 1980s TV series of the same name, starring Lee Majors as a stuntman who moonlights as a bounty hunter.

2024’s The Fall Guy is a very loose “reboot” though, with star Ryan Gosling’s iteration of lead character Colt Seavers still a highly skilled stuntman. He is definitely no bounty hunter though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EySdVK0NK1Y

After suffering a devastating injury due to a stunt gone wrong, Colt cut all ties with the filmmaking world, including his camerawoman girlfriend, Jody Moreno (Emily Blunt). One year later, he’s eking out a miserable living in Hollywood when a surprising call from producer Gail Meyer (Hannah Waddingham) draws him back into the industry.

Jody is getting her big break as a director on a blockbuster project starring Tom Ryder (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), the world’s biggest action star, for whom Colt was the stunt double for many years. However, Tom has gone missing after falling in with an unsavoury crowd, and his disappearance threatens to shutter production if the studio financing the film gets wind of it. Gail whisks Colt to the set in Australia to assist with both finishing the film’s major action sequences and tracking down the missing Tom. It’s Colt’s chance to save Jody’s filmmaking dream from crashing and burning before it even gets started… except nobody has told Jody about any of this.

Emily Blunt is Judy Moreno and Ryan Gosling is Colt Seavers in ‘The Fall Guy’. (Photo: Universal Pictures)

Cue action, comedy, romance, and a whole lot of movie magic for the people who love the magic behind movies. Throughout the film, Leitch and his team highlight the incredible behind-the-scenes wizardry that goes into making the movies audiences love — that dangerous work, as in the case of stunt performers, mostly going unheralded by the likes of the Academy Awards.

There is also a constant meta throughline as Blunt’s Jody fights back against producers who want to do everything with post-production VFX while she wants to shoot her film — an absurd sci-fi-western-romance-epic titled “Metalstorm” — with real performers and tactile effects. All of that is mirrored by Leitch’s steady cinematography and measured editing which takes pains to show that it is actually Gosling and the cast doing a lot of the stunt work themselves in the film’s many practical action sequences.

Aaron Taylor-Johnson in ‘The Fall Guy’. (Photo: Universal Pictures)

Star leading performances

That said, the film’s greatest practical effect is its two leads. Gosling and Blunt dial up the chemistry to the max whenever they are together, whether working through the heartbreak of their past romance or rekindling their synced-up working relationship. When their reunion does not go quite as Colt expected, it means that even when there are no pyrotechnics on screen, there are always figurative fireworks, keeping the film’s two-hour runtime brisk and breezy.

It is Gosling, in particular, who is a charisma machine in the film. He is electric with whomever he shares the screen (special mention going to the aforementioned Waddingham, and Winston Duke as Colt’s best friend and stunt coordinator, Dan). The actor has been on a run of great roles for a few years, but Colt Seavers may just be Gosling’s best yet for how it lets him deliver on every level. His charm is so effortless it is supernatural, his comic timing is impeccable, and he is the perfect mix of goofball and action hero as Colt comically discovers that all the amazing physical skills he’s acquired over the years don’t always work so well when somebody is actually trying to kill you in the real world.

Ryan Gosling is Colt Seavers in 'The Fall Guy'. Image: Universal Pictures

Ryan Gosling is Colt Seavers in 'The Fall Guy'. Image: Universal Pictures

Ryan Gosling in ‘The Fall Guy’. (Photo: Universal Pictures)

If there is any criticism to be made about The Fall Guy, it is that Leitch occasionally does not frame the action for maximum awe and effect, resulting in a handful of the bigger stunts appearing smaller than they actually are. Luckily, a behind-the-scenes reel that plays out during the film’s end credits showcases just how good the film’s stunt performers actually were as they put their bodies on the line to achieve these showstopping sequences.

On the flip side, there is some film-within-a-film silliness when it comes to how the stunts in Jody’s Metalstorm are haphazardly thrown together in comparison to the meticulous staging of The Fall Guy’s set pieces.

Hannah Waddingham is Gail Meyers in ‘The Fall Guy’. (Photo: Universal Pictures)

Emily Blunt is Judy Moreno in 'The Fall Guy'. Image: Universal Pictures

However, these fumbles, along with a couple of iffy plot points, are easy to overlook.

The Fall Guy is a riot. Even when it’s got something noteworthy to say about the film industry, or Colt has to go through a bit of character drama, it’s never weighty or preachy. Leitch, Gosling, and Blunt are here to entertain, whether that be by launching themselves from moving cars onto helicopters or sizzling with romantic alchemy, and they succeed uproariously.

As things stand currently on the box office side, The Fall Guy isn’t close to making back its $150-million budget. However, there’s been a tiny glimmer of hope recently, so maybe the scrappy flick can get back up again after taking a huge fall, just like its titular character. And, given how good Gosling is here, the idea of The Fall Guy becoming successful enough for some more screen time with Colt Seavers gets a very enthusiastic thumbs up. DM

The Fall Guy is in South African cinemas now, having released on 26 April.

This story was first published on Pfangirl.