The Fall Guy: An ode to stunt work

Director David Leitch started off his career as a stunt double, and followed that by opening up his own action design production company named 87Eleven, but he’s most well known for his co-directing work with director Chad Stahelski on the 2014 action megahit, John Wick. With such a wide breadth of work in the stunt world under his belt, it was only fitting that he eventually make a film dedicated to the unsung heroes of action movies.

The Fall Guy is a loose adaptation of the 1980s television show of the same name, and takes the show’s concept of stunt people moonlighting as bounty hunters and fits it for a new audience. Colt Seavers (Ryan Gosling) is a stuntman who retires after a stunt gone wrong causes a potentially career-ending spine injury. 18 months later, he receives a call from producer Gail Meyers (Hannah Waddingham), who informs him that his ex-girlfriend, Jody Moreno (Emily Blunt), is directing a new action spectacle in Sydney and has requested he come out of retirement and return to set. Reluctantly, he flies to Australia to find the main actor has gone missing, and he’s been appointed to find him.

Barbie might have been the best thing to happen to Ryan Gosling’s career. For years, he was stuck playing the stoic with a troubled past, but Greta Gerwig unleashed a gift to the world when she allowed him to go back to the goofier roles of his childhood. He’s exceptional in this, bringing a lot of that aloof energy to this role, but instead of being a complete goofball here, he’s a competent one. He’s a veteran stuntman and handles himself as such. He knows everything about the industry and remains a consummate professional while still being playful. He allows Leitch to use his physicality in a cartoonish way that really works for the movie’s more bombastic action scenes. Throughout the entire movie he oozes charisma, and has great chemistry with everyone he shares the screen with. There’s a French stuntdog that becomes a sidekick in the movie and he even has phenomenal chemistry with him. Without taking up too much time, the dog may be the best action stuntdog acting since John Wick - Chapter 4, but somehow more realistic here considering the dog just feels like an actor on set rather than an actor in front of the camera. 

Emily Blunt also gets a fair amount to do here as camerawoman-turned-director Jody Moreno. She runs the set and is in charge throughout. Her comedic work here is just as good as Gosling’s, and the chemistry that the two share on screen is incredible. If the movie’s action angle had been a full fake out and just a straightforward romantic comedy, I don’t think anyone would complain about having to watch them light up the screen for two hours. On top of that, she gets a pretty competent action scene later in the film that rivals her badass scenes in Edge of Tomorrow. The supporting cast is having fun here, and it shows. Winston Duke plays Dan Tucker, Colt’s sidekick, proving yet again that you can put him in anything and he’ll be great no matter the size of the role, the guy needs a big-screen leading role soon. Hannah Waddingham is having a great time as the sleazy producer who knows more than she lets on. She and Aaron Taylor-Johnson seem to be having a fun time trying be the worst versions of the worst Hollywood personalities you can imagine. 

The movie’s plot is pretty surface level action movie stuff. It weaves in and out without really making any sort of lasting effect until the last hour, when it all has to find a way to come together. Instead, The Fall Guy opts for more of an ode to film-making and all those who choose to do that as their job. This could easily have been a bad thing, but the loose approach to storytelling works and allows us to get more of a sense of our characters and their relationships with each other. It gives its romance plot line a chance to breathe, rather than constantly hammering it down the audience’s throat that Jody and Colt used to date before things ended badly. Although predictable in its twists and turns, the journey is so entertaining that it's easy to forgive the movie’s story-based shortcomings. Once the film enters its climax, the stunts all come together and we finally get the stunt person representation we were promised. That isn’t to say that the prior acts have no stunts at all: they do, and they’re done with such finesse that you almost forget that you’re watching a film, and it strikes you more as watching people practice before the cameras start to roll.

The performances are great, but the real star of the show are the stunts. The entire stunt team shows why there really should be a category for best stunt choreography in the Academy Awards. Some of the most impressive moments of stunt work in this film don’t even involve a big bombastic set piece, but just good hand-to-hand combat. One moment that ties the hand to hand with a big action set piece takes place on the streets of Sydney, Australia as Ryan Gosling, Stephanie Hsu and the dog fight henchmen in a garbage truck all on the way to attend a karaoke event. Somehow the scene found a way to be funny, engaging and somewhat tense as Colt races against the clock to make it to the bar before Jody sings her song. David Leitch clearly has a passion for action choreography and has found a way to emphasize it from the director’s seat and allow Chris O’Hare’s stunt design a place to breathe and show off. 

The Fall Guy is a solid, enjoyable ode to the stunt person that carries such a deep reverence for the craft, and acts as a love letter to filmmaking as a whole. Anchored by David Leitch’s clear understanding of directing the thing that he cut his teeth on, some fun performances and some good setpieces, The Fall Guy doesn’t reinvent the action movie genre as a whole, but does exactly what it sought out to do. 

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